Town & Country

source: Town & Country

Trailer—Town & Country

Town & Country

The cast of Town and Country in parts make up for bad parts in the script of this film. Beatty stars as a guy who has cheated on his wife, and keeps on lying to her, sometimes his friends, etc, until it all piles up. Shandling also plays and adulterer who might not be all he seems to both Beatty and his sexy wife played by Hawn. Some laughs to go about, but sometimes a little too drifty (some camera movements have no meaning whatsoever). Still, it's worth seeing if only for Charleton Heston's hammed-up scenes as he pulls out a gun NRA style and gives possibly the funniest line of the movie: "Intimate? Sounds like some kind of homo thing!"

It was a fun little movie. Should it have cost 90 million dollars? No. Does that affect your viewing pleasure? Yes. It's hard not to think of the enormous money these talented people are getting for slumming through a harmless light film. Goldie Hawn does that "Giggle" that she's been doing for 40 years, and it's starting to wear thin. Diane Keaton is daffy. Warren is charming. But all in all, not a bad attempt at a film.

If you like watching Warren in a wrinkled skin costume with harshly penciled eyebrows and tinted hair, then watch this movie. If you would rather remember him in his youth and glory, pick up the film "Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone" and luxuriate in his former beauty. It's sad when people age and refuse to accept who they are. Grandparent material, all of them! These people are probably typical of the wealthy, vapid folk who do populate T& C magazine, but they are boring without any help from the script. What a waste. If you paid good money to see this at the cinema, poor you! If you heard the news that Beatty and Keaton have lost their pizazz ages ago and smartly didn't go to this film, good for you!

Just a terrible mess of a movie that has only the most tenacious plot line running through it. Stories are picked up and dropped willy nilly adding up to pretty much nothing. This notorious flop reportedly cost many, many millions of dollars but they certainly don't show on screen. Diane Keaton and Goldie Hawn try to do something with their parts although they are ill served by the script. Everybody else goes down with the ship, poor Charlton Heston and Marian Seldes are made ridiculous in yet another totally needless subplot. A perfect example of a director and studio lucky enough to gather a great group of talent and then squander them totally.

Warren Beatty is one of those Hollywood icons that has had an inconsistant career. For every Bonnie and Clyde he has made, he has also made Ishtar (which I think is better than this movie). This movie is by far his worst. It feels like a desperate attempt by Beatty to make him feel young by having him sleep around with so many women. The whole cast feels lost in this movie. The characters are all unlikable, especially Beatty's. Why would I sit through a "comedy" where we don't want to be around these people? The usually charming Goldie Hawn and Diane Keaton are rather shrill in this movie. I say read articles about this movie's troubled production. I think that story would be up there with the story of "Heaven's Gate," "Ishtar," "Bonfire of the Vanities," and "Waterworld" as the behind the scenes story is more interesting than the movie itself.

It seems that the people behind this drudge of movie took all their cues from Woody Allen's movies during the 1990s. What I mean is, "Town & Country" is about a bunch of rich New Yorkers cheating on each other. I'm sure that everyone involved in it must be embarrassed beyond redemption for having gotten involved in it (and I don't just mean because of its abysmal performance at the box office). The only good character is Charlton Heston, basically spoofing himself. And how could a great screenwriter like Buck Henry have written this? He should have known MUCH better, given that he wrote "The Graduate". All in all, terrible. Fortunately, the cast members have all done good work since. At least I think that they all have.

"Town and Country" is a critically panned but mildly amusing flick which tells of the marital misadventures of two of middle aged couples (Hawn/Sanders, Keaton/Beatty) who split up over reasons of fidelity. The flick is top heavy with talent on the audience side of the lens with no evidence of same in screenplay and direction. Fraught with meandering repartee, comedic situation which come off like bad improv, a jerky flow, lack of cohesion, no center of gravity, etc. "T&C" isn't as awful as it is an underachiever. Okay for hard up sofa spuds.