THAT OLD FEELING
A film review by Scott Renshaw
Copyright 1997 Scott Renshaw
(Universal) Starring: Bette Midler, Dennis Farina, Paula Marshall, Gail O'Grady, David Rasche, Danny Nucci. Screenplay: Leslie Dixon. Producers: Leslie Dixon, Bonnie Bruckheimer. Director: Carl Reiner. MPAA Rating: PG-13 (profanity, adult themes) Running Time: 105 minutes Reviewed by Scott Renshaw.
Bette Midler is not the star of THAT OLD FEELING, and neither is Dennis Farina. Actually, that's not entirely true. Midler _is_ a star, which is why she gets lead billing, and Farina is at least a recognizable face, which is why he gets second billing. THAT OLD FEELING isn't really about Midler and Farina, however, which is why is needs some kind of warning for unsuspecting audiences. Call it the A TIME TO KILL Memorial Disclaimer: "The big star getting lead billing is actually playing a supporting role, and the previews are remarkably deceptive." Instead of getting a brassy broad starring in a brassy broad farce, viewers will find a surprisingly mellow comedy starring someone named Paula Marshall. It is only because Marshall is so charming that THAT OLD FEELING doesn't fall flat on its mellowness.
Marshall plays Molly DeMauro, a young woman who has just gotten engaged to aspiring politician Keith (Jamie Denton). It should be a blissful time for Molly, except that she knows the wedding will mean getting her divorced parents -- actress Lilly Leonard (Midler) and novelist Dan DeMauro (Farina) -- together in the same place. Dan and Lilly's divorce was anything but amicable, and the expected shouting match causes quite a spectacle at the reception. Unexpectedly, the shouting becomes smooching, as the feuding ex-spouses find their animosity turning into animal attraction. This development causes no end of trouble, as Keith fears the scandal will harm is Congressional campaign, and Dan and Lilly's new spouses -- interior designer Rowena (Gail O'Grady) and self-help author Alan (David Rasche), respectively -- fear they will become exes themselves. It is left to Molly, accompanied by a tabloid photographer named Joey (Danny Nucci), to track down parents who have had the nerve to commit adultery with each other.
The first half-hour certainly fosters the expectation that THAT OLD FEELING is going to be a tart-tongued parade of family quarrels, exaggerated characters and physical comedy. The opening scene trots out the familiar "woman swallows her surprise engagement ring in a desert" scenario (seen most recently in Woody Allen's EVERYONE SAYS I LOVE YOU), but it is still goofy fun. The wedding gives the sniping Dan and Lilly some clever insults, and also introduces the one-dimensional characters of their second spouses. David Rasche is particularly funny as the incessantly jargon-spewing touchy-feely therapist, who talks himself hoarse and makes terribly sincere pronouncements about how important it is "to dialogue and to language." Director Carl Reiner keeps all these elements under control, never allowing scenes to degenerate into pie fights or prat-falls, while still keeping THAT OLD FEELING lively and sharp-witted.
That sharp wit is dulled, however, once Dan and Lilly run off together, drastically reducing the level of comedic tension and shifting the focus to Molly's quest for her parents and for her own romantic happiness. The story ends up emphasizing Molly's ambivalence over her marriage to Keith, but the script by Leslie Dixon gives us no reason to expect any problems between them until the plot arranges to separate them. THAT OLD FEELING needs to lay more foundation for their incompatibility -- more early scenes of Molly's playful streak, more sense of Keith's stuffy careerism and hypocrisy -- so that we understand the story is really going to be about Molly. As it stands, THAT OLD FEELING often seems disjointed. The reunion of Dan and Lilly has little meaning besides as a plot device to get Molly on the road with Joey, and Keith's drunken seduction of Rowena becomes an afterthought to justify our distaste for him. There is too little conflict for too much of THAT OLD FEELING as we wait for Molly to make her choice between Keith and Joey.
Thank heavens Paula Marshall is such a find. She is the kind of actress who seems to be comfortable in any kind of scene, combining an intelligent sexiness with a willingness to look completely silly; the single funniest moment in THAT OLD FEELING may be a depressed Molly drowning her sorrows in a mouthful of spray whipping cream. There are some very nice scenes between Marshall and Danny Nucci, whose photographer begins as a supreme annoyance but gradually develops an adorably scruffy puppy-dog quality, and Molly's romantic dilemma becomes interesting only because Marshall makes her such a flustered sweetheart. While Bette Midler goes about the business of playing Bette Midler (including singing a song) and Dennis Farina enjoys the chance to play against career-long type-casting as a hoodlum, THAT OLD FEELING quietly becomes a showcase for a talented young performer. If you find yourself entertained by THAT OLD FEELING, it may not be in the way you expect, or by whom you expect.
On the Renshaw scale of 0 to 10 side Bettes: 6.
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