In Praise of Women of a Certain Age: “Shirley Valentine” and “Something’s Gotta Give”

No spring chicken myself, I understand the appeal of those films in which ageing women go to extraordinary lengths to retain their youthful beauty. Way back in 1936, the opening scene of The Women was a fancy-schmancy health spa in which society matrons valiantly fought off wrinkles and turkey necks, at enormous expense.  In 1959, under the tutelage of Roger Corman, director Jack Hill went the horror route, using a Leo Gordon script. Their focus was on a female cosmetics executive so worried about preserving her beauty that she broke into a scientist’s lab and stole an experimental serum, made from the royal jelly of queen wasps, that promised to reverse the ageing process. (Naturally, it didn’t end well.) 

Just last year, a female writer/director, Coralie Fargeat, created a contemporary film in the same genre. The Substance. It featured a still-ravishing  Demi Moore so determined to look younger that she went through a horrific metamorphosis that ultimately destroyed her life. Age (and its ominous implications in Hollywood) is also at the center of Sunset Boulevard, once a cinematic classic starring Gloria Swanson and now a Broadway hit musical with the gorgeous but not exactly teen-aged Nicole Scherzinger (she’s 47) in the leading role.

 Given all this, it’s a pleasure to come across films in which a mature woman is hailed as a romantic figure, an actual love object. The only sad thing about these heroines is that they’re played by women who’ve recently left us. But oh, what a lovely light they shed on mature romance. Shirley Valentine is a delightful 1989 British film in which a middle-aged Liverpool housewife (the late Pauline Collins) is so taken for granted by her working-class husband and grown kids that she talks to the walls of her house—and directly to the film’s audience—about the good old days when she was filled to the brim with impish fun. By chance she’s invited by a friend who’s won a contest to join her for two weeks in Greece, and to Shirley’s own surprise she decides to go. On a sun-swept shore she revels in a new sense of freedom . . . even to the point of agreeing to a romantic sail with a handsome local who praises her spunk and her beauty The tryst turns out to have its disappointing side, but the upshot is that she discovers in herself a willingness to change the course of her life. Maybe she’ll resurrect her stale marriage, but on her own terms.

 Then there’s Something’s Gotta Give, a lively Nancy Meyers comedy from 2003, in which a sixty-plus-year-old Jack Nicholson plays Harry, a wealthy music exec who thrives on courting pretty women half his age. Through a series of complications involving his latest flame, Marin (Amanda Peet), he ends up having a mild heart attack at the beach cottage of her divorced mother, Erica (the late Diane Keaton), who’s an ultra-successful playwright. The upshot is that, when Marin returns to work in the city, Erica is stuck babysitting the recuperating Harry. At first they are constantly getting on each other’s nerves. But then, to their mutual surprise, they fall hard for one another, reveling in their mutual smarts and maturity.  And yes, their mutual sex drive. Still, Harry’s commitment-phobic, and the adorable Erica finds she has another admirer, the handsome and very young doctor played by Keanu Reeves. Not bad for a fifty-something-year-old who even carries off a very embarrassed but extremely funny nude scene. Nice indeed to think that a woman of Keaton’s years could be so desirable.

 

 

 

 

 

 

A Film Critic’s Holiday

There’s something to be said for a Nancy Meyers movie. It guarantees that the world is a nice place to live in, and that – when all is said and done – love will find a way. Even if we’re talking about something as basic as love of self, which played a key role in the film for which Meyers earned her first writing credit, 1980’s Private Benjamin. Since then she’s had a share of fifteen other writing credits, including such comedic hits as Baby Boom, Something’s Gotta Give, and It’s Complicated. She also directed the last two films on this list, as well as four others. After a grueling week, a colleague of mine named Madeira James (the web genius behind www.xuni.com) suggested I relax by watching her favorite Meyers film, The Holiday. And so I did.

The Holiday (2006) certainly makes for agreeable company. It’s a Christmas movie of sorts, though half of it is set in a sunny SoCal where the Santa Ana winds blow warm and the affluent splash in their swimming pools year ‘round. (There’s also an impromptu Chanukah party, which I found an endearing touch.) Here’s the basic premise: two attractive youngish women are unhappy in love. Kate Winslet is an English newspaper reporter hopelessly in love with a co-worker who relies on her editorial skills while quietly getting engaged to someone else. She lives in a charming country cottage in Surrey, one I don’t think she could possibly afford. Meanwhile, Cameron Diaz is a workaholic with her own  L.A. movie trailer company. She lives in a fabulous mansion, but her live-in is a two-timing creep whom she angrily tosses from the premises as the movie begins. Since neither Kate nor Cam wants to face the holiday season alone, they link up on a house exchange website. The deal is that each will spend two weeks in the other’s digs before they return to the reality of their own lives.

Of course, this being a Nancy Meyers movie, romance soon rears its head. In that English cottage, Diaz unexpectedly cute-meets hunky Jude Law. Do they bound into bed? Yes, but . . .  it’s complicated. For her part, Winslet (whose sheer joy in discovering Diaz’s swanky surroundings is contagious) meets . . . Eli Wallach? This is not the last film made by the ageless Wallach, who died in 2014 at the age of 98. He must have been about 90 as he took on the role of Arthur Abbott, a crotchety Hollywood screenwriter whose credits go back to the Golden Age. (According to The Holiday,  he was part of the team involved in writing Casablanca, having added the invaluable word “kid” to the deathless “Here’s looking at you.”) Now the Writers Guild wants to hold a big bash in his honor, but he’s too embarrassed by his physical frailty to accept the idea. That is, of course, until Winslet steps up and whips him into shape, paving the  way for a triumphant evening in which he abandons his walker and almost leaps up to the podium to give his acceptance speech. 

Here’s one of many areas in which The Holiday doesn’t make much logical sense. Two weeks are far too short to contain all the activity that this script sets up. But, after all, who’s counting? The actors (including an essential Jack Black) are so charming that we want to believe them. And, despite all the indications to the contrary, we want to believe they can find their happily ever after. Maybe that’s what this film is all about – a holiday from everyday logic.

This one's for Maddee, a delightful and patient lady of many names. If you like the look of my new www.beverlygray.com website, she's the one to thank.