Rating: 
Summary: Touch of Life
Review: Jack Lemmon drove me crazy, and as usual, Julie Andrews is the tolerant, long-suffering spouse. This movie gave me the opportunity to see what these actors real life children look like. The storyline should have focused more on the wife's emotional state instead of the husband's hyperchondria. With the exception of the beach scene and the party, Julie Andrews' character keeps her emotions locked up inside. I felt sorry for her. There were, however, some very funny scenes.
Rating:
Summary: That's career murder!
Review: The film starts with a biopsy: A sampling of Gillian Fairchild's (Julie Andrews) tissue shall decide over life or death. The findings won't be ready until monday. It may cost her her voice. She clears her throat, then she puts on lipstick - an outward sign that she has no intention of betraying her feelings. Her husband Harvey (Jack Lemmon) is celebrating his sixtieth birthday this sunday, and, for heaven's sake, he cannot be upset. Harvey arrives. He is unkempt like a tramp. Self-restraint is not his thing: He doesn't mind if the others take part in his suffering. His garden is well-kept. Plastic-sheep graze on his lawn. But he takes no comfort from his luxurious villa and starts complaining at once. He is vexed that people congratulate him for his birthday, and his clients have no taste. He is plagued by all those infirmities old age has to offer. When his wife dares to argue that he never looked better, he is perplexed: "Are you out of your mind?". He has an amorous impulse - and backs down immediately - there is more that troubles him than just the gout. The food (lobster) is not to his taste and when an obtrusive neighbor (Sally Kellerman) observes Gillian's hoarseness he seizes this as a clue to continue his lamentation. Their children arrive for the planned birthday party. Emma Walton (Julie's daughter) broke up with her boyfriend, Chris (Jack's son) brings his new girlfriend, and the very pregnant Jennifer Edwards (Julie's stepdaughter) is accordingly nervy. But Gillian proves herself as "mother courage" and responds to all their apprehensions. Meanwhile Harvey runs the gauntlet: His physician and an attractive client who tried to seduce him suggest that he consults a psychiatrist and the priest who confesses him turns out to be an old buddy (Robert Loggia). The "happy" family gathers round the dinner-table. No one makes tabula rasa, they dish out banalities. The camera registers this snapshot from behind closed windows... Blake Edwards shot his film in his own house at the cost of about $1 million. An actor's strike took place at the time - the blacklegging did not further the careers of those involved. There is something depressing about Edwards' career: A much beloved director during the sixties (he directed Lemmon in DAYS OF WINE AND ROSES and THE GREAT RACE), he fell completely out of fashion, until he landed a big hit with TEN. His immediate reaction was to make SOB, the ultimate that'll-gonna-show-them-film. During those years, his protagonists were only thinly disguised mouthpieces of himself. With THAT'S LIFE he expected the impossible: He pushed his leading actor into icy water and ordered him to improvise. How can you improvise another man's life? The result are some of the most painful moments in Lemmon's career: The abortive seduction scene is embarrassing enough, but wait until you see him trying to bike himself to death on his home-trainer or visit a fortune-teller (his own wife Felicia Farr). She tells him an interesting fairy-tale about his toes. He leaves her tent - but not alone: crablouses are his constant companion from now on. They itch when he is attending the church...THAT'S LIFE may be Lemmon's most suicidal film. It effectively ended his film-career and, except for the funeral-like DAD he did not return to the screen until the early nineties. Julie Andrews, on the other hand, gives one of her most personal, and therefore essential, performances. Edwards' observation on the lives of the idle rich is accurate, but perhaps too close for comfort.
Rating: 
Summary: See the movie before you review it !!!!!
Review: The main character, Harvey Fairchild, is an ARCHITECT. This is critical to the story and to much of the dialog. My wife and I love this film; it's witty, fun, sad, and relevant to our world today. It's really about a man's mid-life crisis and his revelation about what is REALLY important in life, like family, love, admitting to yourself that you're human.
Rating:
Summary: See the movie before you review it !!!!!
Review: The main character, Harvey Fairchild, is an ARCHITECT. This is critical to the story and to much of the dialog. My wife and I love this film; it's witty, fun, sad, and relevant to our world today. It's really about a man's mid-life crisis and his revelation about what is REALLY important in life, like family, love, admitting to yourself that you're human.
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