tavm Review of Old Boyfriends

Old Boyfriends (1979)

Old Boyfriends is an underrated drama with a nice humorous turn by John Belushi

[7/10 · 26 July 2013]

Continuing to review "SNL"er's early work in movies, we're now at 1979 with the release of Old Boyfriends which has John Belushi playing one of the title characters of lead Talia Shire. According to the book "Wired" by Bob Woodward, when this was released the year after Animal House became a smash hit, Avco Embassy did a dishonest ad campaign emphasizing both Ms. Shire and Belushi in newspapers. In fact, Belushi's sequence was quite short. He played Shire's former high school boyfriend who bragged to all his friends about her going all the way with him. She never forgot about that and so...but I'm getting ahead of myself. I'll just now say that he was funny when the climatic moment came and also-in his character of being a singer-was quite good musically but that should come as no surprise to anyone familiar with his impersonation of Joe Cocker or "Joliet" Jake Blues role. Anyway, Ms. Shire is on a journey to find herself by exploring her past relationships having just divorced her husband. Other former flames she attempts to encounter include Richard Jordan as the one who proposed marriage three times, each of which she refused, and someone named Louis who we find out had died while in service of his country so we meet his younger brother-played by Keith Carradine-instead. That last one explores what might be considered a creepy kind of relationship though considering what Carradine's character was previously going through, I didn't think it was that bad. Other fine dramatic turns come from John Houseman as Carradine's psychiatrist and Buck Henry-yes, Belushi's usual partner in the Samurai sketches on "SNL"-as someone who helps Jordan's character find out about Ms. Shire after she disappears without telling him. Screenplay by Leonard and Paul Schrader is touching and funny in the right places, aided immeasurably by Joan Tewkesbury's direction and music score by David Shire (Talia's husband at the time). So on that note, Old Boyfriends is worth a look. P.S. I found this on YouTube.