User reviews

You have to be in the right mood for this movie. Fortunately the night I watched it I was in the right mood. I enjoyed this movie. It wasn't brilliant but it wasn't awful. The plot was believable. Husband dies tragically, wife bottles up feeling, friends help her through tough times, she helps friends through tough times, her feelings finally come out etc etc. Sounds like a bad soap but is actually quite good.

The best bit of the movie for me was Elizabeth Perkins. For years I have suspected she could act quite well but previous parts haven't given her the chance to show it. This movie did! Elizabeth Perkins did a superb job of pulling off the part of the wife struggling to come to terms with her husbands death. The scene near the end of the movie where she finally broke down was a piece of brilliance on her behalf. Surrounded by three other popular actresses she shines through!

I'm glad I watched it! 7/10.

"Moonlight..." is a slightly massaged and sanitized but insightful and warm look at a woman (Perkins) coping with grief with help from a distaff trio of family/friends. A beautifully crafted piece of work at all levels, this dialogue-intensive film spares us much of the usual mourning melodrama and gets right into the healing process with humor, charm, and sensitivity while exploring the principal's relationships and not lingering too long on the central grief issue. Overall, an entertaining piece which, IMHO, was scored too low by IMDB.com users because of the male side of the jury. Recommended for more mature audiences... and Ebert, wake up and smell the roses.

I'm not one to usually admit I was teared up during a movie but this movie got me at least three times. That alone should give it a 7 rating but I added one more. I guess I really understood Lucy in the movie since those are the type of women I would date. Once you get to know them all, all 4 that is, you can really understand this complex relationship. I will not go into too many details but this is a must watch movie and not a perfect 10 but pretty darn good. I cannot believe that this has under a 6 rating not true at all. So i have to add a few more lines. OK then vote for this movie with your heart not from a spectacularly sensational Hollywood standpoint.

I am only 21, but i watched this movie a LONG time ago with my mom & never really appreciated it...I thought it was awful, but now that I have lost someone (a boyfriend) and have had to learn to lean on other people I really appreciate it and know that it really is a great movie!!!

To me it seemed kind of surreal when i was younger that anyone could be like that... but the speech at the end when she tells Ben bye...now that i have watched it again makes me tear up now just thinking about it. Its hard to look back and have regrets and i get it now.

I loved this movie and i'm thinking about buying it...helps you deal a little bit

I thought that Moonlight and Valentino was a good film. The cast was terrific and brought life to the "talkiness" of the movie.

A widowed woman relies on her friends and a hot painter to get her through the rough time. Jon Bon Jovi is exciting in his first Big Screen role as "the painter". Good climax but it leaves you feeling like it's missing something.

I admit, the main reason that made me wanna watch this movie was Jon Bon Jovi's part in it. Being a huge fan of his, I try to see all of his movies thus I watched Moonlight & Valentino as well. And not just once but four times. The way I see it, the cast did a great job, but the script could have been turned into a better film, had a less flat ending been made, if you know what I mean. I think it's a soft, sweet movie but in a way it's rather dull, or at least ordinary. What I'm trying to say is, with this cast and story, a more effective and more impressive movie could have been made. But maybe that's just me. Other than that, the songs in the movie were real, good. And, on a side note, the part where the ladies think that the painter doesn't speak English but then he surprises them about it is hilarious in my opinion.

It's hard to rate this movie because it had such a terrific cast. The script was dreadful, stupid, silly. You shouldn't actually have to lose a husband to see the absolute falseness of the script. But to cast these great actresses in that story and require that they say those lines was an appalling waste. It is a tribute to their skill that the movie was even possible to watch at all. They did the best they could, but I found it painful to watch, not because I found the story touching but because it was so embarrassingly shallow. You can be sad and funny without being trivial. There are plenty of movies out there to prove it.

I saw this film shortly before watching In Her Shoes with Toni Collette and Cameron Diaz. There are a lot of similarities between the two films. They both have great casts and good acting. They both have stock characters of sisters who are very different, an offensive stepmother, a woman friend/confidant, an emotionally unavailable father, a dead mother and a surprise lover. Both films have the characters experience life-changing realizations and both films suffer from a kind of 'love conquers all' sentimentality. They both add a little titillation with Cameron Diaz in black underwear and a partial back shot of Gwyneth Paltrow naked.

Both films seem contrived, as if the writers of the works the films are based on did market research and said, "Ok, there's a market for stories about relationships between women, so I'm going to write about two sisters with an offensive stepmother…" In other words, instead of the drama emerging from the truth of the relationship, the relationship is invented to fit the dramatic situation. It seems forced, the characters don't seem real, the relationships are unbelievable.

The resolution of the tensions between the characters is simplistic with simple apologies completely whisking away years of acrimony leaving everyone feeling warm and fuzzy ever after. It's just not real. Romantic fantasy.

The characters in In Her Shoes are a little more overblown than Moonlight & Valentino, especially the stepmother part. Sydelle Feller, in In Her Shoes is so evil that it is difficult to believe that the father would stay with her, or even marry her in the first place. Kathleen Turner at least shows some emotional vulnerability as the stepmother in Moonlight & Valentino.

If you liked Moonlight & Valentino you will probably like In Her Shoes as well. Enjoyable performances in both, in fact, the actors bring depth to their parts that goes way beyond the contrived sentimentality of the scripts.

This movie surprised me. I had gotten it ONLY for Jon Bon Jovi as I am a big fan and wanted to see one of his first movies. I thought he was very good as well as irresistable as The Painter. But then I got into the movie and enjoyed the interaction between the women played very well by Elizabeth Perkins, Whoopi Goldberg, Kathleen Turner and Gwyneth Paltrow. Altho a female I am not usually into chick flicks but this was worth seeing.

A Young English professor (Elizabeth Perkins) loses her husband while an anxiety ridden best friend (Whoopi Goldberg), a quirky younger sister (Gwenyth Paltrow), and an attached ex-stepmother (Kathleen Turner) help her come to terms with life and love. First lead role I've seen Perkins take charge, Gwenyth in a new light a role that made me love her even more, Goldberg in the same light as Boys on The Side (1996), and Kathleen Turner pulls off a successful business mother vying for the affection of a daughter that doesn't belong to her, a beautiful thing. Joining the cast are a few of films sexiest men Jeremy Sisto and Jon Bon Jovi. Definitely worth the watch!

Rebecca Lott (Elizabeth Perkins) is struggling after her husband's accidental death. Sylvie Morrow (Whoopi Goldberg) is her best friend. Lucy Trager (Gwyneth Paltrow) is her younger sister. Thomas Trager (Josef Sommer) is their father. Alberta Russell (Kathleen Turner) is her harden stepmother. Then there is the Painter (Jon Bon Jovi).

It's sincere. It's earnest. I think that it's trying to be funny. It's a lot of talking around the subject matter. It's a bit tiring. I feel like I'm working through a death in the family. This is a grind for an hour. I remember when it first came out and Jon Bon Jovi is the reason to see this. I kept waiting for whatever is going to happen. Bon Jovi comes in at around 40 minutes and walks through the door at about an hour. I guess that's interesting maybe. At least, it gives it a little bit of energy in the second half, but it's not enough to save the movie.

I had seen (and subsequently forgotten about) this movie back in the 90s. When you read the list of names in this movie, it seems like it would be great, but somehow it landed flat and flavorless. It was like someone took a chick-flick formula and forced the actors into generic roles that they all were way better than. Elizabeth Perkins is a great and underrated actress, but she's normally second fiddle in the movies she's in. She's not a movie star and although she could and did carry the lead, she's not quite built for that. Whoopie Goldberg was miscast in this, she seemed out of place as the quirky best-friend as that she and Elizabeth Perkins had no chemistry, or at least no chemistry translated on the screen. Kathleen Turner was a heavy hitter in Hollywood in the 80s and this movie seemed to be a huge step-down for her. I didn't understand her character at all as that she was the ex step-mother, it made no sense that the Character was there at all. And Gwyneth Paltrow....(shaking my head). She pouted, whined, had body-dysmorphic disorder, which is never fully explained and although was in college, acted like a bratty tween. I hated her character; it's underdeveloped and what should have been funny and quirky translated to bratty and irritating.

The movie is supposed to deal with grief a la Steel Magnolias, there is even a Sally Field-esque emotional rant by Elizabeth Perkins that didn't land right. She missed the mark on it somehow, or, the towering Mrs. Fields just did is so iconicly that anyone else would seem like a pale imitation, which it did.

The writing is off, not funny and the Whoopi Goldberg Character just seems odd and out of place and the whole movie could have done without her. A slight change in the cast may have made this movie slightly better and able to overcome the shallow writing. This movie had Pete Coyote in it, as Whoopi's character's husband and he isn't even really credited, maybe he clued in that that this was a formulaic, steel magnolia's' knock off and chose to have his participation muted. John Bon Jovi couldn't bring this up out of the depths of meh. And there was NO chemistry between him and Elizabeth Perkins.

I've pretty much given you the whole movie and if you've read this, which doesn't really have any spoilers in it, I've still managed to spoil it. Watch it if you're bored and have nothing else to do on a weeknight in PJs.

It's barely average. It is a solid effort and I could see the actresses were trying their best, but man, the performances were so lackadaisical that I was reminded of a bowl of oatmeal.

This movie is like eating a bowl of oatmeal. It's comforting but a little bland and you kind of want to add some flourishes of dried fruit or maple syrup to make it more exciting. The women in this movie are just average and mediocre in every possible way, and yet they are the focal point of the movie.

The problem is that when you spotlight four characters and not one of them is compelling or can channel any sort of emotional range, everything falls flat. Such was this movie.

The story is lovely in theory - four women's lives intersect after the passing of one's husband leaves her a widow. It's not a bad plot, and there is some levity thrown in, but it was not enough to make this engaging.

I also found the scenes were spliced together in such a disorganized way. I couldn't really tell where any of it was leading. It's basically a roulette of various moments in these women's lives that don't even quite intersect in an intelligible way. It's just a mish mash of random moments.

I'm at a loss as to what this movie really sought to achieve. It's mildly enjoyable in the way that every so often something interesting happens like when the cute painter arrives, or the dorky kid in class flirts with Lucy, but it didn't stir anything more in me than the desire to move on with my life.

Since the first time I saw "Big" (one of my favorite movies) with the beautiful red-headed Elizabeth Perkins, I knew that as an actress she had some real potential. She just needed a little push and the right part and she could have the audience in the palm of her hand, crying right along with her. This movie is getting her there. When Rebekah (Perkins) loses her husband in an accident, turns to her abnormal sister Lucy (Gwenyth Paltrow in an annoying role) her best friend Sylvia (Whoopi Goldburg is adorable!) and her ex-step-mother Alberta (Kathleen Turner has aged beautifully). The three try to help the vulnrable woman back on her feet. In a few scenes we see how vulnerable and sad Becky really is...And those scenes were the most touching. In other scenes we see how sisters interact and how one sister tries to hold off on Alberta for fear of losing another loved one. It's complicated but overall, it's good. I didn't quite understand if abortion was a topic here...It seemed like it during the last segment. Does anybody have a clue? That's the only thing I hate; When they don't make it all the way clear in the movie then you know they could've improved. If you want to see some good acting see this movie. Elizabeth Perkins is gorgeous!

You know you're watching an awful Movie when After it's over you say to yourself, "Wow, and the best part of that was Jon Bon Jovi's performance!"

Even though i had snuck into the cinema(something me and my mates did a lot in the mid 90's), I still felt like demanding my money back afterwards!

i knew i wasn't enjoying the movie when i started to long for the thespian skills of Pauly Shore. I remember going to see this movie like it was yesterday and the bad taste still clings to the back of my throat like the memory of a romance that went sour.

Moonlight and Valentino is a truthful drama about mourning. Elizabeth Perkin's character is well written and well acted. You really feel as if she has lost her husband. She goes through all of the natural emotions of sadness, denial, and guilt. Whoopi's character is annoyingly written, but she adds a human spark to Sylvia. Gwyneth's character is the epitome of an insecure college girl. She is written as if from experience. Kathleen Turner's character is easy to hate in a pitied sort of way. All in all the movie is well written and truthfully told. You are left feeling that even if you do lose the one you love, life will go on.

This movie just cannot decide what genre it wants to be....and is unsuccessful as any of them, particularly comedy or drama. The story begins with a sudden death and the efforts of the widow's friends to console her. Following this is a long line of inane, mostly pointless interactions with no clear plot, and a lot of what we would probably all consider as socially inappropriate dialogue and behavior. The scene in the cemetery put me over the top in thinking the script was totally to blame for creating a cinematic disaster. It is a total flop as an upmarket film, lacking depth, lacking believability about the roles the characters are in, and the cherry on top is a weird appearance/role by Bob Jovi. Did someone really spend millions on this thinking it was artful? OMG

Nepotism in Hollywood? Groundbreaking. Before you cringe at the thought of "Paris Can Wait" - another chick flick disaster, by Eleanor Coppola, a soapish vanity project that only existed because of her husband's last name - allow me to take you back to "Moonlight and Valentino". This little gem of mediocrity is another case of "illustrious relative propping up a project that should've been mercifully euthanized."

Written by Ellen Simon, daughter of the legendary Neil Simon, it's supposed to be a deeply personal, autobiographical tale. But while daddy Simon penned substantial works, Ellen flounders with a script that can only fish from personal experience - and even that lands like a soggy boot. Despite the real-life tragedy (her husband was killed in a hit-and-run), the story never manages to lift off the ground.

The dialogue is a special kind of awful. Think insipid girl-talk so profoundly dumb it could fry your brain cells. The characters? Equally insufferable. Widowed Rebecca, played by Elizabeth Perkins, lacks the charisma to carry the film. Then there's Lucy, her sister, a walking emo cliché embodied by a young Gwyneth Paltrow, whose hatred for ex-stepmom Alberta is so wildly disproportionate it becomes its own subplot. You read that right - Alberta, divorced from Becky and Lucy's dad years ago, is still inexplicably tangled in their family drama. Maybe she just didn't get the memo to leave?

Whoopi Goldberg as Becky's BFF takes the cringe cake, though. Over-the-top, grating, and entirely unbelievable, her marital crises are about as riveting as watching paint dry. Speaking of paint, the sole male character worth a mention is "The Painter." Yes, that's what they call him - because why bother giving Bon Jovi's decent character a name when the movie is so busy drowning in its estrogen soup? And yet, he's the only saving grace in this vapid chatter-fest.

In summary: Moonlight and Valentino is a bland, melodramatic mess that proves not every autobiographical story deserves to be a movie - and certainly not one this insipid.

This movie had me laughing, crying and riding the emotional rollercoaster ride one deals with when faced with the death of a loved one. A "womans" movie as I would call it, with the strength to reach out to the inner emotions and bring them to a head. A movie which could allow me to relate to my own life experiences. I LOVED IT. Very much on a par with the likes of Steel Magnolia and How To Make An American Quilt. Just loved it.

Don't bother inviting any guys for movie night when you rent Moonlight and Valentino; it's a major chic fest. If you liked Fried Green Tomatoes, Steel Magnolias, and Beaches, you'll love it. That being said, I didn't like either of those three, and I still loved it.

It focuses on two sisters, a stepmother, and a friend - an unusual bunch that's bound together, but with great chemistry and ties that are interesting and realistic. I could have easily watched two or three more movies featuring the same group of women and not grown bored. Elizabeth Perkins is the older sister and role model to Gwyneth Paltrow. She's married, a college poetry teacher, and stable. Gwyneth is an insecure college student with anorexia, who smokes to be cool, and has never seen herself nude. She's a very interesting character, and while much is explored and dealt with in two hours, I would have loved to see more. Whoopi Goldberg is Elizabeth's best friend, suffering through marital troubles with Peter Coyote. Kathleen Turner is the proverbial wicked stepmother, according to Gwyneth, but she desperately wants to be close to the two girls in her life. When Elizabeth's husband dies in an accident, the girls rally around her to help with grief and moving on.

Some parts of this movie have pure humor, like when Jon Bon Jovi comes to the house to appraise a paint job and Kathleen Turner compliments his derriere. Some scenes are extremely heavy, like when Elizabeth sobs and reveals a big fight she had with her husband before he died. In one scene, Elizabeth doesn't want anyone to touch her because she's in shock, and a few minutes later she's talking about a cute leather jacket rather than focus on her grief. In other words, it's a very realistic movie. With any group of friends, there's going to be a difference in temperaments that set patterns throughout the years. Gwyneth repeatedly insults Kathleen, but rather than get in a big blow-up fight like in a soap opera, Kathleen merely smiles her pain away and lets the young girl get away with it. Whoopi always puts her best friend first, so it makes sense that we see the resentment building up through the scenes.

Each actress (and to be fair, the few men in the movie as well) has her own moment of brilliance throughout the film. This movie isn't nearly as famous as other friendship flicks in the 1980s and 1990s, but it's one of my favorites. If you don't want to rent it for the acting, at least rent it for the eye candy. I'm sure every girl would break the 'don't date a guy with longer hair than you' rule for Bon Jovi.

A recently widowed woman (Elizabeth Perkins) tries to cope with the help of her baby sister (Gwyneth Paltrow), ex-stepmother (Kathleen Turner) and best friend (Whoppi Goldberg). Talky but fascinating. All the actresses give great performances with Perkins getting top honors--she's just fantastic in a difficult role. All the characters come across as believable and interesting. The script is great too--they talk and act like real people. Nice soundtrack too. Some may deride this as a "chick flick", but I'm a guy and I loved it! Two (minor) quibbles--Jon Bon Jovi is pretty bad as a painter. He's unattractive, not in shape and pretty wooden. It's no surprise his acting career has gone nowhere. And the ending at the cemetery seemed a little overdone but it still works. But, like I said, these are minor complaints. Well worth seeing.

The movie does not leave you with anything, and it seems as though it wanted to. Gwyneth is annoying as usual; her character is to blame too. Whoopi is vivid and charming. Kathleen's character is interesting and real. It sounds like a list, and the movie also does. As Elizabeth Perkins character, it is too neat and structured. The movie's name Moonlight and Valentino makes you expect Bon Jovi to come and effect something, but all he does -after much too long in the film- is steer Elizabeth to a scene that may have worked in the play the movie is based on, but I'm not so sure. All in all: uneven. Most of the time I wanted to see these characters in different situations, perhaps doing something or saying anything. The small storylines are interesting than Elizabeth dealing with the death of her husband: Whoopi and her husband (uncredited Peter Coyote), and Gwyneth and Kathleen. Liked hearing REM's Strange Currencies at the background, and Canda's beautiful.