My first thought upon seeing this depression-era period film was that no one could have ever been so stuffy, stupid, and socially constrained as the middle age/elderly couple played by Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward. But, then, I remembered that my grandparents were just like them, as were most of their contemporaries. What a limited life they led, and thank god for today's enlightenment.
That women could have ever been so totally and willingly dependent, physically and mentally, on their husbands is now hard to imagine, but it did happen and was typical in the days when women did not work outside of the home. The film showed, over and over, dependency scenes that emphasized the helplessness and powerlessness of women in those depression era days. It got real aggravating after a while, but was offset somewhat by Woodward's character's inner goodness and sweetness. She was dumb as a mud fence, though.
Newman was terrifically stuffy and dictatorial in his role and Woodward was terrifically dependent, incompetent, weak and stupid in hers. Wonderful work, and they both often had me steaming with their respective behavior, as I put up with a lot of this type of baloney when young. As their daughter, Kyra Sedgewick showed well that the "future" was going to be a lot different for women than the present by her unmistakable signs of emancipated behavior.
The film's story was ended so well by Woodward's character getting stuck in her car in her garage, as she was so dependent and ignorant about how to do anything in life for herself that she sat in her car for hours without even trying to figure out a very easy solution to her problem. At the end, she was merely sitting there waiting and calling for many hours for others to "rescue" her from her easily solved predicament(if she only could have had an original thought), just as she had done all her incompetent and dependent life. What a great ending, and a great example of how not to be in real life. Thank god again that things have changed.
That women could have ever been so totally and willingly dependent, physically and mentally, on their husbands is now hard to imagine, but it did happen and was typical in the days when women did not work outside of the home. The film showed, over and over, dependency scenes that emphasized the helplessness and powerlessness of women in those depression era days. It got real aggravating after a while, but was offset somewhat by Woodward's character's inner goodness and sweetness. She was dumb as a mud fence, though.
Newman was terrifically stuffy and dictatorial in his role and Woodward was terrifically dependent, incompetent, weak and stupid in hers. Wonderful work, and they both often had me steaming with their respective behavior, as I put up with a lot of this type of baloney when young. As their daughter, Kyra Sedgewick showed well that the "future" was going to be a lot different for women than the present by her unmistakable signs of emancipated behavior.
The film's story was ended so well by Woodward's character getting stuck in her car in her garage, as she was so dependent and ignorant about how to do anything in life for herself that she sat in her car for hours without even trying to figure out a very easy solution to her problem. At the end, she was merely sitting there waiting and calling for many hours for others to "rescue" her from her easily solved predicament(if she only could have had an original thought), just as she had done all her incompetent and dependent life. What a great ending, and a great example of how not to be in real life. Thank god again that things have changed.