After their oldest child passes in a boating accident, the family tries to live a normal life and hide their grief. The younger son struggles to communicate with his parents and seeks therapy to deal with his emotions.
Well, Ordinary People was a good movie. Better than I had expected… because I had heard literally nothing about this movie before we started this blog. Mary Tyler Moore's inspired performance transformed her from the wholesome good girl from The Mary Tyler Moore Show to a biatch…… for real. It was fine… just pretty ordinary… get it? I don't have very much more to say. It was pretty forgettable, in the same vein to me as "Man For All Seasons" and "Cimmaron." I doubt we will watch this ever again but worth it the one time!
Well, Ordinary People was a good movie. Better than I had expected… because I had heard literally nothing about this movie before we started this blog. Mary Tyler Moore's inspired performance transformed her from the wholesome good girl from The Mary Tyler Moore Show to a biatch…… for real. It was fine… just pretty ordinary… get it? I don't have very much more to say. It was pretty forgettable, in the same vein to me as "Man For All Seasons" and "Cimmaron." I doubt we will watch this ever again but worth it the one time!
The title to this film seems rather uninspired at first, but
it makes a lot more sense when you see the film. Essentially, this is the story
of an upper-class family that is trying to pass as completely normal and
“ordinary” despite the recent death of one of the children. They have a
dysfunction that is much more subtle and simmering beneath the surface than,
say, The Royal Tenenbaums in that the
parents completely refuse to acknowledge and discuss the tragedy and how it is
affecting their surviving son. Mary Tyler Moore’s fantastic performance of a
mother hiding from the issue behind her status and social standing by adapting
a cold and unsympathetic veneer is nearly as chilling and frustrating as Nurse
Ratched. I’ve never thought of Timothy Hutton as a great actor; truth be told
whenever I think of him I think of that odd Stephen Kind adaptation The Dark Half in which he plays a
character and his own evil “twin” but Hutton is a revelation here that
completely deserves his Oscar. I enjoyed seeing Judd Hirsch, aka Jeff
Goldblum’s Dad from Independence Day as
Berger the psychiatrist. I know he’s been in a number of other films but that’s
always how I will remember him. I can definitely see where Good Will Hunting got some of its inspiration; I may have even only
slightly mockingly said “it’s not your fault” several times during the climax.
The greatest strength of this film is how it patiently metes out the details of
the story for maximum impact. Actually there are many merits to this film, and
much of it was even pretty memorable, but I can’t shake the feeling that this
film would be somewhat obscure and unknown if it hadn’t won Best Picture. It seems like it would be a better play than a movie, and I
prefer many of the other nominees from that year. David Lynch’s The Elephant Man is a truly fabulous
film from a master director whose other works are sadly overlooked by the
Academy, and let’s be honest, everyone prefers
Raging Bull, the absolutely flawless
Scorsese masterpiece that is now #4 on the AFI top 100. And where’s Ordinary People on that list? Yeah…
Elizabeth McGovern was a student at Juilliard during filming. The school permitted her to do the film on the condition that she leave for Chicago each Friday night and return on Sunday, filming only on Saturdays. It was the first time Juilliard had ever permitted a student to make a film during a school term.
Calvin "Cal" Jarrett: Don't admire people too much, they might disappoint you.
