I stumbled upon this film by accident while surfing TV channels, knowing next to nothing about it. The all star cast and great dialogues at the start of the film got my attention immediately.
However, as the film progressed it got more and more involved in unimportant detail and making sure that we "get it". Some scenes became so painfully long and unreal that commercial brakes actually helped me watch it to the end.
One such scene is when Erica, played wonderfully well by Diane Keaton, gets into a crying rage which was about as distracting as the crying scene in "Up In The Air", albeit for a different reason... A perfectionist woman like Erica would be more likely to hide her emotions even from herself, while bursting at seams and thinking that no one is noticing.
Similarly many other scenes seemed forced. This all leads to a convoluted second half of the film where Harry may or may not be in love with Erica, and where Erica may or may not love him or maybe even hates Harry. It made the film about 30 minutes too long and even worse, it diluted the strength of its characters and story in those lengthy moments of awkwardness. I had a feeling that if many scenes ended up on the cutting room floor, it would be a much better film. Less would be more in this case.
However, as the film progressed it got more and more involved in unimportant detail and making sure that we "get it". Some scenes became so painfully long and unreal that commercial brakes actually helped me watch it to the end.
One such scene is when Erica, played wonderfully well by Diane Keaton, gets into a crying rage which was about as distracting as the crying scene in "Up In The Air", albeit for a different reason... A perfectionist woman like Erica would be more likely to hide her emotions even from herself, while bursting at seams and thinking that no one is noticing.
Similarly many other scenes seemed forced. This all leads to a convoluted second half of the film where Harry may or may not be in love with Erica, and where Erica may or may not love him or maybe even hates Harry. It made the film about 30 minutes too long and even worse, it diluted the strength of its characters and story in those lengthy moments of awkwardness. I had a feeling that if many scenes ended up on the cutting room floor, it would be a much better film. Less would be more in this case.