Tahhh

I found the film very absorbing, but if you're looking for Lillian Hellman's "The Children's Hour," this isn't it.

The fault doesn't lie with the actors or production qualities or the director: I think it's mostly that the script is a bit predictable, and not terribly daring: there are clear-cut good guys and bad guys motivated, on the one hand, by goodness and benevolence, and, on the other, by unspeakable evil and malice.

That is not suggest it's a waste of time: just that the screenplay struck me as too tame and too safe, instead of straying into more dangerous territory, raising tougher questions, and not resolving everything in the manner of (as I've seen others on IMDb saying, justifiably) of a T.V. "Movie of the Week." There are good, emotional scenes and quarrels, which will draw you in, however, performed with honesty and skill by a very fine cast.

When I saw that a TV station was airing a REMAKE of The Women, last night, I anticipated the worst--after all, the stylish original from the 1930's was such fun, that I couldn't imagine how any modern remake could possibly live up to it. I expected it would be so dreadful and politically correct that I'd turn it off within 20 minutes and go to sleep.

Instead, I was pleasantly surprised by a film which was engaging and enjoyable, and which, while BORROWING many of the plot elements from the older film, retold a rather different story, and adhered, almost in a playful manner, to some of the "disciplines" of the original movie, such as never allowing a male to appear on screen.

What really saves this movie is the first-rate performance of Annette Bening, who plays a character named Sylvia Fowler, but who otherwise is a completely different woman from the broad clown character Rosalind Russell created in the older film, with an utterly different story. A similarly successful "transplant" is of Mary Haines' mother, here portrayed wonderfully by Candice Bergen--and another is the role of Edie, here played by Debra Messing (who does give us the sort of broad clowning that we had for that role in the old movie).

One real DISAPPOINTMENT in these updated roles was Bette Midler, who played the character corresponding to the Countess de Lave, expansively and noisily played by Mary Boland in the old movie. The script didn't go into the fun sub-plot of the Countess's boyfriend and his infidelities, and so this character, and its very fortunate casting, remain very tangential; similarly, Cloris Leachman manages to rescue a microscopic role of one of Mary's household staff--but should have been given much more to play with.

Meg Ryan, although turning in a fine performance, is somewhat eclipsed by the talents around her.

However, even though it lacks the style and impact of the classic film, I enjoyed this remake quite a bit, and can recommend it. It won't spoil the old film for you--it's too different from it--and yet, will give you several of your favorite moments from the old film refreshed and renewed, as well as a very different approach to others.

I've heard Iceland called "The Tahiti of the North Atlantic" with reference to a history of sexually loose behavior that goes well back to an era predating the "sexual revolution" in the United States, and I believe Halldor Laxness, Iceland's Nobel Prize-winning author, has a book or two along similar lines, featuring some sexually outrageous situation which is treated rather matter-of-factly, even light-heartedly, by the participants and all around them.

The gentle fun in this film is of a piece with its very charming and amusing opening titles: We see, looking up at him, the hero, intent on performing rhythmic intercourse, with his glasses on; the girl whose charms he is enjoying reaches up to remove his glasses, and view her Romeo's eyes unobstructed; and we then see both the lady--and the titles--fading in and out of a serious blur as the hero continues his push-ups without his necessary spectacles.

The comedy is about this young man of 30, who is a bit of a ne'er-do-well and good-for-nothing, who lazily collects welfare, lives with his working mother (his drunken bum of a father stumbles into him on the street from time to time), and how very strange developments in his mother's sex life lead to him finally becoming a man, earning a living, and being a "fine upstanding citizen" even as he takes on a semi-incestuous role in his mother's life, a role which would shock and horrify most Western viewers if the story were told a bit differently.

It's a pretty, colorful film, very nicely acted, and captures very well the peculiar, quiet atmosphere of Iceland's capital. The film draws me into intimacy with its characters at once, and won me over immediately with its very low-key, simple, and very subtle humor.

Icelanders number less than 300,000, and so are required to demonstrate competence in at least four major world languages in order to graduate from high school. Consequently, nearly all Icelanders under a certain age speak English very fluently. Since one of the major characters is a Spanish immigrant, characters all switch to English when they need to speak to her, and so many scenes are entirely in English that I would call the film bilingual.

It's a very simple comedy, but although the sexual behavior of its main characters is most certainly racy, and the language very frank, I didn't find the film the least bit vulgar or crude, and, instead, found its humor pleasant, subtle, and engaging.

My impression of Icelanders, when I visited there many years ago, was that they could be almost painfully shy people--and in a way, this is a SHY comedy about a very BRAZEN situation.

I think it's WELL worth seeing and enjoying, and I would happily sit through it to enjoy it again.