The Wife

Rating:
Summary: Great film - tepid DVD transfer
Review: I love this movie. Like "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf", this film slowly squeezes the viewer into a bottle-neck of engrossing yet terribly embarassing dramatic situations. At times I found it difficult to breathe while watching this film. It's also very beautifully photographed. However, the DVD transfer is terrible. Mottled artifacts of the MPG (DVD) encoding process can be seen swarming in the shadows, and still-life scenes look frozen and slightly odd. Not recommended. The VHS tape on a good VCR is better, since the film was released widescreen on VHS. They should pull the DVD and re-release with a better transfer.

Rating:
Summary: Great film - tepid DVD transfer
Review: I love this movie. Like "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf", this film slowly squeezes the viewer into a bottle-neck of engrossing yet terribly embarassing dramatic situations. At times I found it difficult to breathe while watching this film. It's also very beautifully photographed. However, the DVD transfer is terrible. Mottled artifacts of the MPG (DVD) encoding process can be seen swarming in the shadows, and still-life scenes look frozen and slightly odd. Not recommended. The VHS tape on a good VCR is better, since the film was released widescreen on VHS. They should pull the DVD and re-release with a better transfer.

Rating:
Summary: Fascinating character study
Review: If only the Hollywood mainstream would make movies with real emotions instead of the lowest-common-denominator hack that is designed for financially safe mass-market appeal; The Wife has only four characters, but a world of complexity is revealed in the interactions and private emotional conflicts of these two couples over an impromptu dinner "party".

Rating:
Summary: The best satire on psychotherapists!
Review: None of the previous reviewers said anything about the real point of this film: honest satire on therapy and therapists. The hilarious dialogues are full of perfectly delivered therapy cliches that can enlighten the audience about the craziness of therapists who are locked in their psychology role. It uses irony to point out the importance of being honest and genuine in relationships. It is a very human film: there is an amazing scene where Wally Shawn dances by himself that is beautiful, poignant and very funny. This movie is highly recommended for well-meaning therapists who can't see just how ridiculous their own languaging can get... But not recommended for therapists who are not experienced enough yet to laugh at their own pretensions. Paradoxically Yours,
A Therapist

Rating:
Summary: Spellbinding, original, gutsy...
Review: This is one of those movies that takes on a difficult subject and looks at it a thousand different ways. In any other hands than Tom Noonan's, it would have been as hypocritical and as shallow as its subjects and filled with celebrities & predictable one-liners.

Rating:
Summary: Excellent Character Study
Review: Tom Noonan and Shawn Wallace, of My Dinner with Andre fame, give exemplary performances as a new age 'authentic' therapist and a new age wreck respectively. When Wallace's character shows up unexpectedly, with his wife, at the therapists home the results are startling and sweet but not unexpected. This movie unfolds with a subtle brilliance and pace that is not often seen in American productions.

The Wife is well worth the rental but it is unlikely that the chain video stores will have it as a part of their collections. You might have to borrow it from a friend or buy it. Sadly the DVD is very sparse and has few extras but that shouldn't deter you from seeing it.

It is a great accompaniment to a winter's dinner of penne in a light clam sauce with a bottle of merlot slightly chilled. For dessert a rice pudding would be appropriate.