Premise: After a woman’s boyfriend leaves her and her daughter and rents out their apartment to someone else, she convinces the new tenant to keep them around until one of they can afford to go elsewhere.
I’m familiar with Neil Simon as a brand or film genre although I’ve seen very few of the films based on his work. I think it’s just Murder By Death and Biloxi Blues. The Goodbye Girl feels more quintessentially Neil Simon than either of those. And I didn’t care for it.
There’s a staginess that I couldn’t get past. Not the limited locations in the film. It’s more in the dialogue and the premise. It’s all a little too precise. It started with the beginning scenes that feature unnatural sounding ADR. It didn’t seem mixed right, and maybe that was something about the DVD transfer. Regardless, it immediately removed me from the world of the film. The story feels much more like a 5-season sitcom that they tried to squish into a movie. I needed several seasons of Richard Dreyfuss and Marsha Mason’s dynamic for the story arc to feel earned. As is, it was rushed.
Aspects of this are just dated. Not much can be done about that. “Gay Richard III” isn’t the punchline it was in 1977. It’s not that it’s offensive. It’s just not that clever. I assume in 1977 it was met with uproarious laughter where now it’s more of a light chuckle. I definitely see how Richard Dreyfuss won his Oscar for this. It’s a movie star performance, even if it doesn’t hit the same for me now.
I get it. Neil Simon’s work was very influential and imitated. Part of why The Goodbye Girl doesn’t work for me is because his work has been adapted and imitated for decades. I’ve seen people ape his style and build off it so much that going back to the real thing now feels like imitation. The only context I have is my own though.
Verdict: Weakly Don’t Recommend
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