THE STORY OF US (Universal) Starring: Bruce Willis, Michelle Pfeiffer, Rob Reiner, Rita Wilston, Paul Reiser, Tim Matheson. Screenplay: Alan Zweibel and Jessie Nelson. Producers: Rob Reiner, Alan Zweibel and Jessie Nelson. Director: Rob Reiner. MPAA Rating: R (profanity, adult themes, sexual situations) Running Time: 92 min. Reviewed by Scott Renshaw.
As THE STORY OF US nears its conclusion, Katie Jordan (Michelle Pfeiffer) finally breaks down. Katie, a detail-oriented crossword puzzle creator, and her husband Ben (Bruce Willis), a free-spirited writer, have spent the summer in a trial separation while their two kids are away at camp, trying to determine whether their 15-year marriage is worth saving. Finally, the tense meetings and what's-best-for-the-children rationalizations dissolve into tears as Katie rants for several minutes about everything that has been right and wrong with their relationship, and about the history they share. It is a wonderfully affecting moment, beautifully performed by Pfeiffer with all the love and frustration that makes up a marriage. It's a moment that can't help but bring mist to the eyes of anyone who has known that love and those frustrations.
It's also a moment that is a complete cheat. Theoretically, THE STORY OF US is the story of how easy it is, in the middle of all the white noise and tension of everyday life, to lose track of why you fell in love with someone in the first place. Unfortunately, it's such a fragmented narrative that it's just as easy for the _audience_ to lose track of why they fell in love in the first place. The script by Alan Zweibel and Jessie Nelson sprinkles flashbacks through the summer of the Jordan's separation -- a peek at their meeting and first date here, an interrupted dalliance on the butcher block there -- but there aren't nearly enough of them. THE STORY OF US spends virtually all its time showing us the relationship already in trouble, making it incredibly difficult to appreciate what made the relationship good in the first place. We're asked to invest ourselves emotionally in the success or failure of the Jordans' marriage without getting enough evidence that it should succeed.
It's even more frustrating to realize that THE STORY OF US is so solid at its core that it could have been wonderful. The film is not always a pleasant experience, showing off some extremely unfair fighting between its protagonists and the wrenching moments when emotional damage seems beyond repair. Willis and Pfeiffer deftly turn their post-separation scenes into awkward shuffles between longing and despair; where most films treat divorce either as all-acrimony or all-indifference, this one captures how much people want it all to work out. But at only 92 minutes, THE STORY OF US feels bereft of context. Somewhere on the cutting room floor is the arc of a relationshp from affection to simple coexistence to a blur of petty bickering.
If only more of the so-called humor had found its way to the same floor. Along for comic relief are some usually reliable performers -- director Rob Reiner as Stan, Ben's best friend; Rita Wilson as Rachel, Katie's best friend and Stan's wife; Paul Reiser as Ben's agent -- who wind up stuck with painfully un-funny material. Wilson rants about how men never change the toilet paper roll, a gag that hasn't gotten any fresher since it was generated by bad stand-up comics 20 years ago. Reiner waxes philosophical about how "there is no ass, just the fleshy tops of your legs." Reiser spends five minutes degrading an idea for a book about Ben's grandparents, inspiring only stony silence from the audience. Reiner and his writers keep trying so hard to lighten the mood they only end up breaking it, with little to show for their efforts but a few half-hearted chuckles.
It's easy to see the comedy as part of Reiner's attempt to create a companion piece to his 1989 gem WHEN HARRY MET SALLY. With its direct addresses to the camera and hairdo-change time lapses, THE STORY OF US does sometimes feel like WHEN HARRY LEFT SALLY. Yet while this film was unlikely to be as purely entertaining, it could have been far more resonant. Some of the individual scenes in THE STORY OF US are heartbreaking, and a few are truly charming. They just never quite add up to the story of them in a way that provides real catharsis. Just before Katie's big emotional scene, we get a 60-second montage of hights and lows from a 15-year marriage. It's easy to understand why those snippets would move Katie to tears; after all, she lived those moments. THE STORY OF US could have moved us all if only we'd been allowed to live them, too.
On the Renshaw scale of 0 to 10 separation anxieties: 6.
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