Postcards from the edge (Meryl Streep)

(Amazon UK link)

I sometimes spend a few minutes browsing Amazon’s ‘recommendations’ to me, based on films I have bought. I always read the blurbs and usually one or two negative reviews before adding something to my wishlist. We have a lot of films, so I’m quite picky, now, about choosing any more. ‘Postcards from the edge’ stars Meryl Streep, and features several other well-known actors, and was mostly positively reviewed. I added it to my list, and was given it for my recent birthday. 

So last night we decided to watch it. The image on the front and general feeling suggest a comedy of some kind. But I didn’t look at the blurb on the back, and had forgotten what I read on Amazon. So I had no idea what to expect. 

The film opens with a dramatic scene. A helicopter descends, someone leaps out, then Meryl Streep and two friends are stopped at a border, and she is accused of something terrible. However, it would be a spoiler to say what happens next, as the surprise is cleverly done.

Streep’s character is called Suzanne, who must be in her late twenties, no more than thirty. She could easily have passed for twenty-four or twenty-five, despite the fact that Streep herself must have been over forty when this film was made in 1990. And once again, this versatile, brilliant actor becomes the character, in a way that few others manage. When we watch a film with Meryl Streep, we barely remember her in other roles, as each one is so different, and she manages them all to perfection.

Suzanne, we quickly learn, is a struggling actress who has a problem with drugs. After a nasty incident, she ends up in rehab and we meet her mother Doris, who is a perfectly made up Shirley MacLaine. It’s evident that the two have something of a difficult relationship; Doris tries hard to be loving and non-judgemental, but she can’t keep it up for long. And she is forever talking over her daughter, convinced she knows best what she should be doing. 

The subject matter is a serious issue, not one that would normally be turned into a light-hearted film. Apparently this is based on a true story, although it may well be quite loosely based. Suzanne works hard to be free of her habit, taking up smoking instead. Doris is an alcoholic, though she seems mostly to have her drinking under control. And Suzanne is chased rather determinedly by a somewhat pushy young man called Jack (Dennis Quaid).

Into the mix comes Doris’s own mother, whose name I didn’t learn, but she’s played by Mary Wickes: an overbearing, judgemental, loud and critical woman. I didn’t like ‘Grandma’ at all. Her husband has dementia and keeps complaining about her in a way that I thought was bittersweet: he is able to say what other people are thinking, in a somewhat amusing way; yet his condition is not one to take lightly or joke about. 

There are some insights into the stresses and pressures that go into making movies - or did, in the 1980s; I don’t know how much it has changed since then. It is perhaps caricatured, but almost certainly has some truth in the horrors and degradations, and the way some actors are (or were) treated. 

The acting is superbly done, the pace just right and the story well told. I didn’t know some of the actors, but I recognised Simon Callow’s distinctive voice before seeing his character. On the other hand I didn’t spot Richard Dreyfuss as a doctor. 

There’s some singing, too; Doris, in her younger days, was apparently a stage singer, and Suzanne has an amazing voice too, though she doesn’t want to give in to her mother’s pressure to be a singer rather than an actor. 

I wasn’t sure I was going to like the film in the first twenty minutes or so, but I quickly became absorbed and overall thought it excellent. The rating is 15 which reflects some ‘strong’ language and the drug theme, though by today’s more relaxed standards it might be reduced to 12. 

Recommended if you like quite hard-hitting dramas with some light-hearted moments, or if you’re a fan of Meryl Streep. 

x Review copyright 2025 Sue's DVD Reviews

The Apartment (Jack Lemmon)

(Amazon UK link)

An elderly friend was giving away her DVD collection, moving to online films. Despite being twenty years younger, we prefer physical DVDs or blu-rays, and were delighted to be offered as many of them as we wanted. We selected about twenty-five which looked interesting, and last night decided to watch ‘The Apartment’. 

We had no idea what this was about - I didn’t even read the blurb on the back - but knew it was black-and-white. I thought that might bother me, but it wasn’t a problem at all. However we were a tad surprised to find that the premise of this film is quite risqué - and I’d have thought would have been shocking in 1960 when the film was first shown. But it won several Oscars, so perhaps people were less prudish then. 

Jack Lemmon is the main character, a young executive known as CC Baxter, who works for a huge insurance company in New York. He’s quite ambitious, and has discovered a way of hastening his rise to the top. He has an apartment which he lends to senior colleagues who want to ‘entertain’ young women. They, in turn, write positive comments about him in the office, leading to rapid promotion.

Of course nothing is simple, and we see poor Baxter walking up and down on a chilly evening, after staying late at the office. The light is still on in his apartment, so he knows he can’t interrupt. And when someone wants to change a booked tryst - or when Baxter himself is sick, and needs to be at home - he has to make extensive phone calls adjusting everyone else’s schedules.

It’s somewhat ridiculous, of course, and the film is light-hearted and exaggerated. Yet there’s apparently more than a grain of truth in the premise of professional married men playing around. And it certainly seems possible that a young and ambitious man could get himself caught up in this kind of scheme, which rapidly snowballed out of hand, in the hope of rising beyond his colleagues.

Naturally there’s a love interest for Baxter, in the form of Fran Kubelik (a young Shirley MacLaine), who works as an elevator operator. He talks to her, and she appreciates his courtesy but when he eventually plucks up the courage to invite her out, she’s reluctant - we don’t learn why until later in the film. 

The acting of the 1950s and early 1960s looks overdone and exaggerated by today’s standards, and the only person we thought at all believable was Fran, who displays almost every possible emotion in a sympathetic and believable way. The office philanderers in their suits feel like people from a bygone era although perhaps they still exist. And CC Baxter is an odd mix of honest, kind and thoughtful, yet so seriously ambitious that he has no problem compromising his integrity.

Still, the pace is excellent, the script realistic (given the bizarre nature of the film) and we didn’t feel that the film was over-long despite it being a full two hours. The rating is PG but it’s not a film I would show to young children, or even young teens; quite apart from the rather sordid storyline, there’s a lot of talk about sexuality (even if mostly euphemistic), some minor - but disturbing - violence, and a couple of very tense scenes. 

On the whole we liked it, but I’d only recommend it if you like this era and style of film. 

Review copyright 2024 Sue's DVD Reviews

Terms of Endearment (Shirley MacLaine, Debra Winger)

(Amazon UK link)

We were ready to watch a film a little earlier than usual last night, so decided to opt for one of the slightly longer ones in our ‘to-watch’ drawer: ‘Terms of Endearment’. This drawer contains some films we have not yet seen, and some which we haven’t seen for at least nine or ten years. Neither of us could recall having seen this before, but as we watched it, some scenes were familiar. I later discovered that we first saw the film towards the end of 2011.

‘Terms of Endearment’ was produced in 1983, although it feels rather older. Shirley MacLaine is wonderful as the rather uptight Aurora, who worries about many things and has a hard time expressing any emotions. The first part of the film sees her panicking that her infant daughter Emma has stopped breathing, something which apparently happens every night. She’s happier when she manages to wake her daughter, and then hears her crying.

The scene is done in an exaggerated way to show that it’s light-hearted but it’s bittersweet; the worst could have happened, after all. And the next scene shows the aftermath of the funeral of Aurora’s husband, when Emma is perhaps eight or nine. We fast forward to Emma’s student years, and then to the eve of her marriage to a young man with the bizarre name of Flap (Jeff Daniels), who is a teacher. Emma (Debra Winger) is very close to her friend Patsy (Lisa Hart Carroll), apparently in a romantic sense; but both plan to marry men and to have babies.

Aurora doesn’t approve of Flap, and feels that the marriage will be a disaster; she is quite possessive as a mother, and phones Emma every morning. She’s horrified when she learns she’s going to be a grandmother...

It’s entirely a character-based film spanning three decades, although the majority of the action (such as it is) takes place after Emma and Flap are married. Aurora has a string of devoted admirers, including her next-door-neighbour, a very sleazy former astronaut called Garrett (Jack Nicholson) and also Vernon (Danny deVito) who seems to be there purely for the humour he’s able to inject into what’s sometimes quite a poignant story.

There are some amusing scenes and some clever dialogue; there are also many different demonstrations of family dynamics, and the difficulties of communication between men and women, and between the generations. There’s a very sad ending to the film which we had both entirely forgotten about, and some interactions that I found quite moving.

The whole was beautifully done. I was totally caught up in the story and it didn’t feel as if it were too long at all. I almost wish it could have lasted longer. The cast members were all perfect in their roles and the pace was just right for a gentle character-based film.

The UK rating is 12A which I think is about right. There’s nothing explicit but quite a few implicit references and scenes. The bad language is mostly mild but there are some ‘strong’ words used, and the storyline is not one to appeal to children or even younger teens.

Highly recommended to all who like this genre.

Review copyright 2020 Sue's DVD Reviews

Steel Magnolias (Julia Roberts, Sally Field)

(Amazon UK link)

It’s nearly ten years since we watched the film ‘Steel Magnolias’, and we had both forgotten what it was about. However my husband remembered the first scene as soon as we saw it: a man shooting birds out of a tree while preparations for a large wedding are going on around him. I had no memory of that, but as the film progressed I recalled the climax to the story, and also quickly grasped the general theme.

It’s good that I remembered roughly what was going on, as I had a very hard time, at first, tuning into the strong accents from the American South. Julia Roberts is the main character, Shelby. She’s quite young (this film was made in 1989) and it’s her wedding that’s going to happen the following day. We quickly learn that she and her fiancé Jackson (Dylan McDermott) have had an argument and she said she wouldn’t marry him. But they make up… although she clearly has some reservations.

However Shelby’s mother M’Lynn (Sally Field) is, in my view, the star of this film. We first see her fussing about everything being perfect for the wedding, and then being overprotective of her daughter. But then gradually we discover why. She has an extremely expressive face, and while I didn’t agree with everything she said or did, I could empathise with her strongly - all the more towards the end, during and after the climax of the film. I had forgotten when this occurred, and what situation prompted it, but knew how it ended.

M’Lynn and Shelby live in a small town where everyone knows everyone else. And the theme of the story is the strong supportive nature of these people, particularly six very different women (with names so strange that I didn’t know what they were until I looked up the cast list on iMDB to check for the actors). Dolly Parton is superb as Truvy, the town’s hairdresser and beautician. She gossips, and flirts, but feels things deeply and is very caring.

We meet her near the start of the film interviewing a young and nervous girl called Annelle (Daryl Hannah) who desperately needs a job. Annelle is a bit of a strange character and had the accent that was most difficult to understand. I never entirely believed in her.

The other two main characters are two older women: Clairee (Olympia Dukakis) and Ouiser (Shirley Maclaine). These two have a love-hate relationship and provide a lot of the comedy in the film. Ouiser is grumpy most of the time (often with reason) and Clairee likes to stir…

The main story, which begins with the day before Shelby and Jackson’s wedding, takes place over the course of a little over a year. Emotions run high at times, but are interspersed with plenty of light relief and a great deal of warmth. Yet there’s a depth to this film and the incident towards the end, which shocked me the first time I saw it, seemed inevitable this time. And it’s very well done, as is the aftermath.

All in all, we thought it a well-made film, a better than average ‘rom com’. The rating is PG; there are some sex references but nothing explicit, and no violence - even the bird-shooting is done with blanks. I don’t recall much ‘strong’ language although there are plenty of mild expletives. However it’s unlikely to appeal to anyone below the age of about twelve.

According to one of the 'extras', this film was inspired by a true story.

Review copyright 2020 Sue's DVD Reviews

In her Shoes (Cameron Diaz, Toni Collette)

(Amazon UK link)

My relatives in the UK like to shop for birthdays and Christmas from wish-lists (as do I). So from time to time, I browse Amazon’s recommendations to add a few books or DVDs to my list. I’m not entirely sure why this ‘In her shoes’ was suggested to me, however. Perhaps I had rated another film with Cameron Diaz. Or perhaps it was the genre - mildly amusing light ‘rom-com’ style - that led to this suggestion. In any case, the blurb sounded good, the reviews were mostly positive, so I added it. I was given it for Christmas nearly a year ago, and we finally decided to watch it last night.

Actually we had started to watch it about a month ago, on an evening when I was very tired. For some reason I found the opening sequences too confusing, and somewhat gross. We see a lot of shoes, and two young women. One of them is in compromising positions at an office party, then throws up and phones her sister, who’s in bed with someone else. It was hardly an auspicious opening on an evening when I wanted something light and totally undemanding.

However, last night I was more wide awake and willing to try again. I still didn’t much like the opening, but the story quickly becomes more interesting. Cameron Diaz’s character, Maggie, is basically a spoilt brat who can’t keep a job. She seduces men at every opportunity, and even steals money from family and friends. Her older sister Rose (Toni Collette) is sensible, hard-working… and lonely. In almost every respect she is a contrast to Maggie, except that they both like shoes.

They evidently have a stormy relationship, and Rose regularly bails her sister out while trying to persuade her to look for work. But this time Maggie does something so awful that Rose severs the relationship entirely. At that point, Maggie goes to visit a long-lost relative (Shirley MacLaine) and finds herself staying in a retirement centre for senior citizens. Gradually she starts to take more responsibility - and at the same time we see Rose begin to throw off some of the shackles of responsibility, and start to live a more bohemian lifestyle.

There’s a romance involved, but it’s not the main feature of the film, and the hero (Mark Feuerstein) begins as a rather dorky guy, pushing for a date in a not particularly attractive way. The scenes at the retirement centre are wonderful; there are some very amusing scenes, and some great lines. Apparently (as we learned in one of the ‘extras’ on the DVD) the people shown are not regular extras, but the people who were actually living in the centre concerned, playing parts that suited them best. They did a wonderful job, with humour and skill.

Rated 12A (PG-13 in the US), there’s nothing too explicit but several bedroom scenes with strong implications, and some mild swearing. I can’t imagine it would be of any interest to anyone younger than about fifteen anyway.

It’s not the kind of film I’m likely to watch again in a few years (not that I do that much anyway!) nor one I’ll necessarily remember in future. But the issues related to the importance of family connections lifted it a little above the average, and it made a very enjoyable evening’s viewing.

Review copyright 2017 Sue's DVD Reviews

Elsa & Fred (Christopher Plummer, Shirley MacLaine)

(Amazon UK link)

I didn’t really know what to expect of this film, but it has an all-star cast, and Amazon recommended it to me as a gentle light romance. So it went on my wish-list and I was given it for Christmas. I realised that it was about an elderly couple, as the main title roles are played by Christopher Plummer and Shirley MacLaine. But I think it’s a positive move that films are being made about those in middle age as well as those beyond it.

The story starts as we meet Fred’s rather bossy daughter, who is helping him to move into a small apartment. He was widowed some months before the story opens, but although he’s not really grieving, he’s a bit lonely, and quite a hypochondriac. His daughter arranges for someone to cook, clean and provide company for him, but he’s cantankerous and prefers to spend his days in bed…

Then his neighbour Elsa comes into his life. She’s lively and imaginative, although we quickly realise that she has a habit of embellishing the truth, or even making up stories entirely to suit her purposes. She’s a dreamer, but she and Fred soon become friends…

It would be hard to say more without spoilers. It’s not a fast-moving plot, nor is it particularly original. But it’s nicely done with touches of humour here and there, and I found it mostly very engaging. I can’t say I particularly liked Shirley MacLaine’s character; I felt it would have been better played by one of the other well-known actresses in their early 80s, but on the whole the pairing works, and it’s a nice back-to-front touch that their younger offspring were the ones worrying about them, telling them what they should and shouldn’t do, and generally disapproving.

Since I associate Christopher Plummer primarily with ‘The Sound of Music’, I found myself expecting him to break into ‘Edelweiss’ when he picked up a guitar… and there was a bit of cognitive dissonance when Scott Bakula appeared as Elsa’s reliable accountant son; I’ve only known him as the star of the lengthy ‘Quantum Leap’ series. But he was believable, as was his artist brother, whereas I had a hard time believing in Fred’s controlling and unpleasant daughter and son-in-law.

Rated 12, which I suppose is about right; I did notice one instance of ‘strong’ language, and perhaps a couple of minor words, and there are several implied bedroom scenes, although nothing at all explicit. I’m a little surprised it’s not PG from the legal point of view, but the storyline would be of no interest to a child, or even a teenager; indeed, I wouldn’t really recommend it to anyone under the age of about forty.

The ending is bittersweet, as was inevitable almost from the start, but nicely done. Overall it made a pleasant evening’s viewing even if there wasn’t much that was memorable or thought-provoking.

Review copyright 2016 Sue's DVD Reviews

Terms of Endearment (Shirley MacLaine, Debra Winger)

(Amazon UK link)

I knew that 'Terms of Endearment' was a classic film from the 1980s, and something of a weepy; but probably would never have bought it, had I not spotted it on a church bookstall for a euro.

When we sat down to watch it, we were not entirely sure what to expect. Shirley MacLaine stars brilliantly as Aurora, an over-protective mother who is widowed at a young age, so brings up her daughter Emma (Debra Winger) as a single parent. They are very close during Emma's childhood, but as she grows up, she needs to exert her independence. Emma and Aurora find themselves clashing, particularly - early in the film - over Emma's wedding.

The film spans three decades of their relationship, although it mostly takes place during Emma's adult years. It demonstrates their very different personalities and responses to people, with superb characterisation. Aurora is outgoing and somewhat brash, while Emma is more gentle and insightful. We see them not just with each other, but with friends and lovers - there are some amusing scenes with Aurora's astronaut neighbour, played wonderfully by Jack Nicholson, as well as more poignant ones.

I found myself completely captivated by the story; it was beautifully done, with some deeply emotional scenes as well as plenty of light humour. I thought it excellent in showing how people express their love in such different ways, and how - in the end - nobody can protect their offspring forever.

Definitely recommended. Rated 15 in the UK, probably due to sexual references and some very strong language in a few places, but - oddly - only PG in the USA.

Review copyright Sue's DVD Reviews, 7th November 2011

Steel Magnolias (Dolly Parton, Sally Field, Julia Roberts, Shirley MacLaine, Daryl Hannah, Olympia Dukakis)

(Amazon UK link)

From time to time I put a DVD on my wishlist due to the recommendation of friends, only to find Amazon recommending several more that I have not heard of, in similar genre or featuring one of the same actors or actresses. 'Steel Magnolias' was one of them. A quick browse of the blurb and reviews persuaded me that it would be my kind of film.

This story is about six rather different women in the US South, who live in the same neighbourhood and who regularly see each other at the beauty parlour. The parlour owner, with the unlikely name of Truvy, is very well played by Dolly Parton. Indeed, one of the quirks of this movie is that all the main women have slightly odd names, the least unusual being Shelby (played by Julia Roberts).

As the story starts, Shelby is preparing to be married, with her household in an uproar. She and her mother, naturally enough, find themselves at the beauty parlour discussing it, and it’s not long before we learn that Shelby is diabetic.

The blurb on the back of the DVD case says that this is the ‘funniest movie ever to make you cry’. I consider that to be serious hyperbole there since I neither laughed nor cried while watching it. Still, it is undoubtedly moving in places, and the characters (once I had got used to the strong accents and the bizarre scenario of a beauty parlour) really very likeable. There were a few amusing moments, too.

I was less impressed by a tragedy which I should probably have foreseen, but which I didn’t quite believe would happen in the context of a fairly light mildly humorous film. Still, it works well and was overall an engaging movie. The interactions between the women are mostly believable, and the story surprisingly thought-provoking for something that was really a 'chick-flick'. I felt quite involved with the story and the people, and was sorry when it ended.

Recommended. Rated PG in both the UK and USA. Nothing really unsuitable for young children, unless you are very strict, but I doubt if it would be of interest to anyone younger than about eleven or twelve.

Review copyright Sue's DVD Reviews