Sunday, September 8, 2013

An Unmarried Woman (1978)



          To get a sense of why essayist/novelist Tom Wolfe christened the ’70s “The Me Decade,” look no further than An Unmarried Woman, one of the deepest dives into feminine psychology any mainstream American filmmaker has ever attempted. Although the movie nominally tells the story of a woman trying to find love again after her husband leaves her, the real goal of the picture is to let one individual express her personal angst. And while the issues the heroine articulates are germane to an entire generation of females, since divorce rates skyrocketed in the ’70s, the words “I,” “me,” and “mine” dominate the dialogue. From quiet scenes of the lead character embracing the joys of being alone to leisurely sequences depicting talking-and-listening therapy sessions, this movie takes introspection to a new extreme. On many levels, this approach is rewarding, and it’s safe to assume that male viewers who caught the picture during its original release exited theaters with a deeper understanding of the ladies in their lives. However, it must be offered as a caveat that viewers who don’t groove on pictures in which characters discuss their feelings at copious length will find An Unmarried Woman about as pleasant as a visit to the dentist. Writer-director Paul Mazursky commits, big time.
          Set in New York City, the picture follows the adventures of Erica (Jill Clayburgh), a with-it intellectual. When the story begins, she’s happily married to businessman Martin (Michael Murphy), with whom she’s raising their daughter, bright teenager Patti (Lisa Lucas). One day, Martin announces he’s met someone else, so Erica suddenly realizes how much of her personal identity was subsumed during nearly two decades of marriage. As the movie progresses, Erica commiserates with her girlfriends, re-enters the dating scene, and works through complicated feelings with her shrink, Tanya (played by real-life psychotherapist Penelope Russianoff). Eventually, a love story emerges between Erica and strong-willed abstract artist Saul (Alan Bates), but Erica’s reluctance to repeat the self-sacrificing mistakes of her marriage creates believable complications.
          Virtually every scene in An Unmarried Woman is, to some degree or another, credible and meaningful. Mazursky shoots the picture with a naturalistic style that puts performances first, and one gets the strong sense he gave his actors ample license for improvisation. The major shortcoming of the picture, therefore, is an embarrassment of riches. Running a bloated 124 minutes, An Unmarried Woman contains many scenes that could (and should) have been cut or at least trimmed. A little navel-gazing goes a long way. Yet the strengths of the picture, particularly the key performances, easily outweigh the weaknesses. Clayburgh is wonderfully complicated in the picture, fragile and flawed and funny. Bates and Murphy are both good, too, with Bates offering a ’70s take on the hirsute he-man with an intellectual bent and Murphy effectively portraying a schmuck overwhelmed by the depth of his own feelings.

An Unmarried Woman: GROOVY

8 comments:

Will Errickson said...

I watched this for the first time a few years ago, and halfway thru' I was like, I love this movie! So I paused the DVD and looked it up online... only to find that Clayburgh had died that very day. A fantastic portrait not only of a woman but of the 1970s, and NYC of the day as well. The throwing-up bit alone is priceless.

Peter L. Winkler said...

It's vignette-ish, but didn't strike me as overly long. I think is the first mainstream American film where a character throws up onscreen (The Exorcist doesn't count, for obvious reasons).

Anonymous said...

Peter Winkler, I think the first mainstream American movie where a character throws up on-screen and it is a rather prolonged one is 'Husbands' from 1970. Of course that is only if you consider a John Cassavetes film to be 'mainstream'.

Peter L. Winkler said...

You got me!

Tommy Ross said...

Well I love Jill Clayburgh and I love Paul Mazursky so I'm gonna have to check this out. Unfortunately the DVD and VHS both out of print and fetch double digits, so I'll try to find it streaming. Thanks Peter!!

Anonymous said...

Although it's shot in silhouette, you can hear Vivien Leigh vomit the radish she plucked from the ground and gobbled down just before the intermission in Gone With the Wind. Also, in Rosemary's Baby Mia Farrow barfed up the raw liver she ate after catching a reflection of the horrific deed in the toaster.

Kaejae said...

Jill Clayburgh gives one of the top ten movie performances OF ALL TIME in this Brilliant Movie !!!!

fakebaconimprov said...

Love the naturalistic performances from both Lisa Lucas and Penelope Russianoff. Also love the frenetic turn from Cliff Gorman.