erick73
08-07-2001, 08:06 PM
This is a pretty good movie, although the initial effect is disconcerting, like watching a sit-com that is painfully real and not just escapist fare. The players, Demi Moore and Rob Lowe as the lovers, and Jim Belushi and Elizabeth Perkins as their jealous friends, are very good, and Director Edward Zwick is to be complemented on getting so much out of all of them. The script, loosely based on David Mamet's play "Sexual Perversions in Chicago," is filled with sharp, clever and sometimes insightful lines worth quoting.
One is when Moore breaks off the relationship with her boss to be exclusively with Lowe. Taken back, he says, "But I thought we had something special." She replies, "No. It was sleazy, and now it's over."
Another is when Moore's sensitive and brutally sarcastic (and jealous) friend Perkins arrives for Thanksgiving and says to Lowe about cloddish, working-class Jim Belushi, who hasn't arrived yet, "Your vulgarian friend is downstairs denting innocent people's fenders."
After the two lovers move in together, and she has more than a drawer in his apartment and doesn't have to carry an extra pair of panties in her purse, they begin with "I love..." (awkward pause) "making love with you" (pure Mamet). But when he doesn't share his feelings with her, she says, "I don't want to be your roommate anymore. I had a roommate."
What she wants is emotional intimacy. A woman needs emotional intimacy because then she knows where she stands and she has some control. They move closer and she (caught unaware) says, "I love you." He (on the spot, camera close) replies, "I love you too." She sheds a tear, just one, as they hug, perhaps in joy, or perhaps because she doesn't know whether he really loves her or not, and it's so very, very important. The next day Belushi asks who said it first and cavalier Lowe says he did. Belushi, who boorishly fancies himself a lady's man, lectures his friend on just how very poor studly style that is.
"About Last Night" is really about forming and securing the bond between a man and a woman. It's trial by fire. Their emotions are on edge and their individuality is threatened. And all around them are people and circumstances, and their very own animal natures, testing and probing the strength of the bond. When it breaks the pain is enormous.
Lowe says: "I didn't fool around. Not once!" Moore rejoins: "Give the boy a medal. I didn't realize it was such a sacrifice."
Then comes her awkward and sad double date with the nerdy card trick artist with the British accent. Perkins says, "Couldn't you just listen to him all night?" and we're thinking, NOT for even one minute.
Meanwhile we have Lowe's casual pickups. Meaningless sex, and then not even that. But when he saves his friend's cafe, he grows up.
Belushi and Perkins are wonderful as "opposites attract." They fight the magnetism to the very end-speaking of which, the best part of the movie is the ending. It is perfect.
It should be noted that the movie is larger than Mamet's one-act play and covers ground not even considered in the play. The play was a somewhat crude, but insightful, comedy about sex. The movie is a popular drama about relationships.
9/10
One is when Moore breaks off the relationship with her boss to be exclusively with Lowe. Taken back, he says, "But I thought we had something special." She replies, "No. It was sleazy, and now it's over."
Another is when Moore's sensitive and brutally sarcastic (and jealous) friend Perkins arrives for Thanksgiving and says to Lowe about cloddish, working-class Jim Belushi, who hasn't arrived yet, "Your vulgarian friend is downstairs denting innocent people's fenders."
After the two lovers move in together, and she has more than a drawer in his apartment and doesn't have to carry an extra pair of panties in her purse, they begin with "I love..." (awkward pause) "making love with you" (pure Mamet). But when he doesn't share his feelings with her, she says, "I don't want to be your roommate anymore. I had a roommate."
What she wants is emotional intimacy. A woman needs emotional intimacy because then she knows where she stands and she has some control. They move closer and she (caught unaware) says, "I love you." He (on the spot, camera close) replies, "I love you too." She sheds a tear, just one, as they hug, perhaps in joy, or perhaps because she doesn't know whether he really loves her or not, and it's so very, very important. The next day Belushi asks who said it first and cavalier Lowe says he did. Belushi, who boorishly fancies himself a lady's man, lectures his friend on just how very poor studly style that is.
"About Last Night" is really about forming and securing the bond between a man and a woman. It's trial by fire. Their emotions are on edge and their individuality is threatened. And all around them are people and circumstances, and their very own animal natures, testing and probing the strength of the bond. When it breaks the pain is enormous.
Lowe says: "I didn't fool around. Not once!" Moore rejoins: "Give the boy a medal. I didn't realize it was such a sacrifice."
Then comes her awkward and sad double date with the nerdy card trick artist with the British accent. Perkins says, "Couldn't you just listen to him all night?" and we're thinking, NOT for even one minute.
Meanwhile we have Lowe's casual pickups. Meaningless sex, and then not even that. But when he saves his friend's cafe, he grows up.
Belushi and Perkins are wonderful as "opposites attract." They fight the magnetism to the very end-speaking of which, the best part of the movie is the ending. It is perfect.
It should be noted that the movie is larger than Mamet's one-act play and covers ground not even considered in the play. The play was a somewhat crude, but insightful, comedy about sex. The movie is a popular drama about relationships.
9/10