tonyvmonte-54973

So after viewing Love Story, Mom and I decided to watch this sequel, Oliver's Story. Yes, Ryan O'Neal returns as Oliver Barrett IV as the movie begins during his beloved Jenny's funeral. Only other returning cast member is Ray Milland as O. B. III, his father. Someone else played Jenny's dad who, after a little over two years, suggests Ryan's character go with him to singles' bars. Oliver also has a college friend invite him to dinner with his wife as they also invite a woman friend which leads to an awkward dinner. Oliver walks with this friend to her home and there's an interesting dialogue scene at her place but that's all we see of her. We then meet a Marcie Bonwit Nash (Candice Bergen) as she joggles and he runs to her. He seems smitten but her attitude about certain things rubs him the wrong way. I'll stop there and just say that while we both were a little unsatisfied with the way things ended, it was pleasant enough especially when they went to Hong Kong. So we say give Oliver's Story a look. P. S. Nice to recognize some bit players like Benson Fong in Hong Kong who previously was one of Charlie Chan's sons, Charles Haid as that college friend before becoming Andy Renko on "Hill Street Blues", Swoosie Kurtz as his wife before doing other movies like The World According to Garp and TV shows like "SIsters", and Ann Risley as one of the bar women before becoming a cast member of the ill-fated sixth season of "Saturday Night Live".

After years of only knowing about this film by reputation-good and bad-I finally decided to check this out from the library on Valentine's Day. I watched it with Mom who had seen it before though since it was so long ago she forgot many of the details. She seemed touched as was I. I mean, seeing the late Ryan O'Neal and Ali MacGraw together as this young couple who met at college as opposites-him being rich and she being not too well off-was pretty compelling even though it's such a familiar premise. The fact that Ryan doesn't get along with his father and Ali does with her dad to the point of calling him by his first name was also pretty interesting. If anyone reading this review is familiar or not with how it ends, I won't reveal it but I will say it was quite touching. Kudos also to Francis Lai for the now-iconic music score. So, yes, Love Story is still a worthwhile film. Maybe I'll try to get the sequel Oliver's Story sometime soon...

When I saw the DVD box of this movie at the library and saw Jane Fonda's name attached to it, I felt the need to borrow it right then and there. Here she's a young married woman who's suffering some kind of disease who resents her husband for being careful with her when she just wants to go out and have fun which she gets when she meets her hubby's friend from England. That Englishman himself is suffering from his marriage to a woman (Angela Lansbury) who's self-conscious about her appearance because of a scar somewhere on her face (which isn't revealed for a while) so she initially doesn't go outside. That changes when she, her husband, and Ms. Fonda travel to Greece. In summary, this wasn't great but it's very interesting watching Ms. Fonda early in her film career and Ms. Lansbury chewing the scenery. And it's only less than 90 minutes! So I say give In the Cool of the Day a look.