The Woman in Red (1984)

Highly Overrated But Still Good

In truth, any opportunity to see the film on the big screen is welcome.

Easily the biggest piece of Right wing non sense propaganda I ever saw.

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

While this is an American film version of a foreign film, it seems more to be a rip-off of "10". Married Gene Wilder spots a beautiful woman (Kelly Lee Brock) and becomes obsessed with her. He basically spends 90 minutes humiliating himself, leading on a needy secretary (Gilda Radner, totally wasted), and making excuses to his devoted wife (Judith Ivey). Radner tries to be funny with her "Fatal Attraction" like revenge, but the material betrays her. Some good shots of mid 80's San Francisco and a series of pleasant songs by Stevie Wonder and Dionne Warwick (including the Academy Award Winning "I Just Called to Say I Love You") help make this a slight bit more tolerable, but the humor is juvenile, the set-up beyond believable, and the script (by Wilder) dull. A scene with one of Wilder's workers pretending to be blind in a restaurant and destroying it is a pale imitation of the similar scene in the W.C. Fields classic "It's a Gift" and totally out of place.As for LeBrock, she is certainly eye catching in the garage scene wearing the titular red dress, but is a beautiful block of ice otherwise. Wilder is a talented comic, but he seems to be holding back (strange considering he was directing himself speaking his own dialog!) and is definitely missing the partnership that shown on screen for him with Mel Brooks and Richard Pryor in previous ventures. Radner, one of the funniest women since Lucy, deserved much better in the few films she made, and her presence is a total missed opportunity. Ivey would fare better on stage and in later character roles where she was truly able to let herself go. Joseph Bologna and Charles Grodin are even more wasted as Wilder's cronies. With talent like this, you expect so much more.

Gene Wilder's third (and penultimate) film as star-director is also his most consistent effort – albeit one that was a remake of a successful French original, i.e. Yves Robert's PARDON MON AFFAIRE (1977). Wilder ideally casts himself as a happily-married advertising agent whose chance 'encounter' with the stunning title character (portrayed by débutante Kelly LeBrock, a former model and future Mrs. Steven Seagal!) in an underground parking-lot thrusts him into a frenzied, amusing series of amorous complications. Aiding Wilder in his clumsy extramarital travails are his three buddies – gay Charles Grodin (his 'blind man routine' is side-splitting), married but perpetually horny Joseph Bologna and rotund Michael Huddleston – all of whom have their own sentimental troubles to contend with. To makes matters worse for Wilder, ugly duckling office colleague Gilda Radner mistakes his attentions for Le Brock to have been intended for her and goes through several physical and emotional changes in her quest to please her 'man' and, after realizing her error, hilariously takes sweet revenge on the understandably bewildered {sic} Wilder. Complimenting all the above quite nicely is Stevie Wonder's song score that, not only features duets with Dionne Warrick, but is highlighted by the Oscar-winning "I Just Called To Say I Love You".

This has an interesting premise, but those who made it couldn't take it seriously. Gene Wilder does his usual shy, reserved, should-I-or-shouldn't-I cutey. He and his juvenile muchachos act like children. He becomes obsessed with a woman in red whom he sees dancing over a heat grate. The movie is more about his mid life crisis (same old stuff) and how he maintains his status among these guys. He has the attractive wife, the adorable kids, and finds himself escaping an inevitable crash. It just doesn't work. Given a serious treatment and Wilder's acting ability, it could have been fairly nice. We are left to sort things out and hope for the best.

The fine line between comedy and tragedy is on display in this picture. This is a truly vile film. Comedy? Not even close. The message of this film is that everybody's a lying cheat and will never learn from their mistakes. A truly tragic pronouncement.Maybe the language barrier affected this adaptation of its French source material. The cultural insulation films receive by way of subtitles might have made this sad mess hysterical. Find a print in which the actors speak Mandarin with English subtitles and let me know whether it's zany, OK? Never knew an alleged comedy could be so depressing.