"The Wife"

As "The Wife" opens novelist David Castleman (Jonathan Pryce) and his wife, Joan (Glenn Close), are anxiously awaiting a phone call.  In the middle of the night, the call comes from Stockholm:  Castleman has been awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature.  The couple celebrates, and then we get glimpses into their marriage as they are toasted by friends and travel to Stockholm to receive the award.

Castleman is a pompous, narcissistic bore....he is begrudging and overly critical of his son's own attempts at writing fiction....most importantly, he takes Joan for granted and publicly overlooks her talents, which she has sublimated over her lifetime in order to feed his own, and the degree to which she has done this becomes more and more apparent as the movie unfolds.

The movie includes several flashbacks of the younger David and Joan showing how they met and the early years of David's struggles to become a serious novelist.  In these flashbacks, Joan is played by Annie Starke, who is the real life daughter of Glenn Close, which is a pretty cool piece of casting.  

There is also a key character of a writer who wants to do a biography of the new Nobel winner, a project with which the Castlemans want no part.  He is played by Christian Slater, and when was the last time you saw him in a movie?  It was one of those times where you're watching and saying "I recognize that guy, but I just can't put my finger on exactly who he is."  It's a key role, and Slater pulls it off nicely.

This is a a dramatic movie.  If you're looking for a lot of laughs, super heroes, or seeing things blow up, "The Wife" ain't it.  What you do get is a well written and directed character study that is thought provoking and insightful.    I'm not sure just how commercial "The Wife" will be or if it will find a big audience.  Too bad if that is the case, as Marilyn and I really enjoyed it and highly recommend it.

It gets Four Stars from The Grandstander.

Glenn Close as Joan Castleman

Glenn Close is a six time Academy Award nominee who has yet to take home the Oscar.  (I know what you're thinking:  How could she NOT have won in 1988 for her role in "Fatal Attraction", but she didn't, and Cher, of all people, did.  Another instance where the Academy got it wrong.)  All the reviews and buzz about "The Wife" says that THIS will be the role that will finally get Close her Oscar.  We'll see, but another nomination is a cinch and will be well deserved.  Just watch her face in a couple of scenes (when David accepts his award from the King of Sweden, and when he makes his speech at the banquet that follows).  It is one terrific piece of acting that you are seeing up there on screen.