Saturn in Opposition

This is a film that tries to do for men what countless movies have done for women: expose the real pain men feel when love is lost. We've seen the genre exploited for the female market ad infinitum. We rarely see it for men.

That's the theme of this movie: how do men deal with the loss of love? For those of you who have seen it and are questioning what the movie was about, consider it. . . . There's the lover who abandons, the lover who is abandoned, the father who rejected, and the lover whose lover dies.

Aside from the title, a major clue is the reference to "Rebecca," a film about a man who grieves for lost love, and yet who is accused of murdering that love. It is perhaps the ultimate movie about submerged male emotion. In that film the woman (the second wife) is both a participant and an observer, as is the case with most of the women in this film. Then there's the title, a reference to a Saturnalia, a "party" where traditional roles are reversed. In this movie, it is the women who observe the men dealing with lost love, not the other way around as it usually is.

It's not difficult for me to understand the "tepid response" of some reviewers, particularly those who are male. Males are so unplugged from this part of life that it is understandable they could watch a whole movie about lost love and not recognize what it is.