THE ODD COUPLE II
Reviewed by Harvey Karten, Ph.D. Paramount Pictures Director: Howard Deutch Writer: Neil Simon Cast:Jack Lemmon, Walter Matthau, Christine Baranski, Barnard Hughes, Jonathan Silverman, Jean Smart
When the most successful playwright in history grinds out another script, the public takes notice. Neil Simon, whose Tony award-winning "Biloxi Blues" in 1984 won him renewed respect from critics after a couple of years of duds, received even more kudos during that Broadway season for recasting "The Odd Couple" for women. But the film version of "The Odd Couple" did not match its 1970s TV embodiment when Felix Ungar (Tony Randall) played his cranky, compulsive personality off the slob-inspired character of his boorish roommate, Oscar Madison (Jack Klugman). The trouble with "The Odd Couple II" is not so much its deja vu, but its inability to make two seventy-year-olds as vital as the youthful originals.
"The Odd Couple II" is on a level with "Grumpy Old Men," which is about two single retirees (Walter Matthau and Jack Lemmon) living in Minnesota who turn into libidinous teenagers when a beautiful widow (Ann-Margret) moves across the street. As though Howard Deutsch felt he could direct a less malnourished comedy than Donald Petrie, he dished out its sequel, "Grumpier Old Men," whose claim to classic status consisted of the same odd couple spouting epithets at each other and arguing about their children's coming wedding. Now, in "The Odd Couple II," Oscar Madison and Felix Ungar are back after a seventeen-year period of living apart--Oscar in Sarasota and Felix in New York--reuniting to attend the marriage of two of their children.
Most of the story takes place on Los Angeles highways as the two old buddies renew their animosity as they travel from the L.A. airport to the site of the wedding in a small California town whose name, San Melina, they seem unable to recall. Admitting that they get along "like oil and frozen yogurt," the two travelers lose their Budget rent-a-car as it rolls down a hill and bursts into flames. They get mixed up unwittingly in a scheme to transport illegal aliens, winding up in the office of a small-town sheriff (Barnard Hughes). They are sprayed by pesticides on a remote California highway, have a near-affair with two biker girls, Thelma and Holly (Christine Baranski and Jean Smart), and are briefly taken on a joy ride by the two trashy husbands of the aggressive women.
Most of the one-liners center on sex and aging, Oscar and Felix metaphorically discussing the decline of their "wicks" and determined to revive the joys of adolescence before their situation regresses even more. (Remember that the movie was made before the FDA approved the drug, Viagran.) In one unconvincing episode Felix, despite his experience with three marriages, is tongue-tied when he acts to take an aircraft seat next to a woman he has just met, Felice (Mary Beth Peil).
The movie's main intention is to spoof old age, which it does by its stereotypes of the elderly, taking particular aim at the man-hungry Florida widows (nicknamed in the cast notes as "The Grouch," "The Whiner," "The Nosher," and "The Vixen"). During a poker game in Sarasota Oscar serves them the only foods that senior citizens are allegedly capable of handling, including tofu corned beef and a no-fat, no- cholesterol, no taste pastry. The men get off easier. In the opening baseball game, the youthful players, who are making one error after another on the field, are chided by Oscar, who is commenting on the game from the stands: "The old cockers in the stands are better than the young cockers in the field."
There are some amusing moments in the film as you might expect from a Neil Simon script acted by two veteran comics, but you may at times actually wish that director Howard Deutch would install a laugh track to avoid the periods of dead air between one-liners. Cognoscenti of Simon's works will recognize a repetition of the theme of the final scene of his "Plaza Suite," as a mother and father fight among themselves over the best way to get their daughter out of the bathroom and down to the ballroom where her guests await her. But where Mamma yells in that one "I want you to come out of the bathroom and get married!" there is only a pale imitation of that wit as Oscar confronts his about-to-be- married son (Jonathan Silverman), who has escaped to the roof in conflict. Rated PG-13. Running time: 95 minutes. (C) Harvey Karten 1998
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