Darling Companion (2012)

A Disappointing Continuation

Instead, you get a movie that's enjoyable enough, but leaves you feeling like it could have been much, much more.

The acting in this movie is really good.

This movie tries so hard to be funny, yet it falls flat every time. Just another example of recycled ideas repackaged with women in an attempt to appeal to a certain audience.

A gripping story driven largely by four fantastic performers - Diane Keaton, Kevin Kline, Dianne Wiest and Richard Jenkins, it tends to wander but makes its point and keeps you fascinated even though the plot twists seem unnccessary to a story which pretends to be romantic comedy in the opening scene until it goes in a different but marvelous direction. Keaton plays the role Woody Allen used to play decades ago when Keaton was once his co-star in several movies he directed. The central theme - four people brought together in sometimes isolated wilderness settings for purpose "A", yet finding their own way through self realization plan "B" was more tightly and brilliantly done by Deborah Kerr and Richard Burton leading the brilliant cast of "Night of the Iguana". To the four leads are added two supposedly supporting players who probably have as many lines and as much screen time as do the leads- the housekeeper of the second mountain home owned by Keaton and Kline and the nephew of Kline. These two supporting characters end up on a romance of their own which seems not necessary to the story- one does some soul searching in the fashion of the four leads but finds out less and one does no soul searching at all while playing what is normally the deus es machina to send the four leads out into unknown backwoods country in which much of the realizations take place.

I'm going to rate this film higher than most are. I think it's a pretty decent LITTLE film that appeals to a limited audience. Who's in that audience...well, frankly, us older folks. Oh, don't get me wrong. This is not a great film. But it's a decent LITTLE film about mature relationships and marriages and what makes them tick. And by the way, several sites list this as a comedy. It is a drama, not a comedy.One of the highlights of the film is the scenery and photography. Autumn in southwestern Colorado! But, of course, we're not watching it for those reasons. That's just a bonus.Girl meets dog. Boy loses dog. Marriage in a shambles. That's the crux of the story.It's the performances that make the difference. And these are not great performances. But they're kinda real. I'm more sympathetic to the husband than most of our reviewers. He's a surgeon, and I'm getting ready to have surgery in about 10 days. I want my surgeon to be thinking exclusively of me that morning...not worrying about a lost dog. Now that's not to say that the doctor has been a great husband; clearly he takes his marriage for granted. Kevin Kline does fine here, although this is certainly not his best role..by far.This is probably the most different role I've ever seen Diane Keaton in...as the wife of the surgeon...struggling in a somewhat lifeless marriage who rediscovers her love in a rather odd set of circumstances...partially lost in the rain in the woods and resetting her husband's dislocated shoulder.Richard Jenkins is a much underrated actor, probably because he's far from handsome and thus, not the movie-star type. But he fairly consistently turns in fine performances, and while this is not a "great" role, he subtly fine tunes his performance.The rest of the performances are fine, but not notable. Even Diane Weist, who is usually so good, just sort of gets by here in a part that relegates her to a comparatively minor role. The Israeli actress Ayelet Zurer has a somewhat interesting role as a modern-day gypsy.You're not going to walk away from this film saying how great it was. But I think you may enjoy a quiet little movie with some realism in it.

Finally a movie about the lives of older folks in which the young take second place. Remember Diane Keaton in Looking for Mr good Bar and Sleeper? Well now she's a lot more mature and wears glasses.Kevin Kline,remember him in Big chill?Now a lot more mature as well.Diane Wiest. She's changed too. Diane plays beth,who just bi her grown daughter and her grand son baby, at the airport, Elisabeth Moss ,plays Keaton's second daughter Grace,who drove her to the airport.Keaton character is worried that her second daughter has not found Mr right had gotten married.While Beth's husband ,played by Kevin Kline is so busy as a spine surgeon,she complaints that he has no time for he.Diane Wiest plays Penny her sister, who just got married to Russell ,played by Richard Jenkins,But her son ,who's a surgeon, played by once again ,Mark Doublass,Doublass? ,of the Other sisters sisters ,fame, is worried that her husband isn't working and she's still supporting him and Russel wants her to invest in a English pub ,in the mid west for him to open up.Well Diane ,as she's coming home from air port,I think, finds a injured sick dog,which she rehabilitates and names him Freeway.This dog, that now she take care of start to improved the families life.Grace meets veterinarian Sam,an India decent American,played by Jay Ali.They both fall in love with the aid of the dog.So as the whole family are at a cabin to celebrate the wedding,after the wedding Freeway gets lost and Beth can't leave until they can find the dog,Penny and her husbands maid Carmen ,a Gypsy,played Ayelet Zurer by uses what little psychic ability to help them find the dog.This is when the problem happen,in searching for the dog.Bryan and Carmen get to know each other better.Diane and Kevin get lost in the woods looking for the dog but they kindle their love for each. Lindsey Sloan plays one of the citizens who helps Kevin and Jenkins to find Freeway.Robert Bear plays Possum ,who a rude resident that chases both Jenkinds and Kevin out of his property. Very older Sam Shepherd,plays the kind fun loving Sheriff Morris,with kidney stone problem .A some time funny very sentimental movie.I saw this at Starz on demand.02/25/13

I AM a menopausal chick, and this flick does not cut it. All this talent wasted on a completely predictable plot ["We're getting older!!!" Unhappily they're not doing that in an interesting way, either]. It was not even funny, ever, except for one line. We kept watching it, hoping it would get better. It never did. The Kevin Kline character was a believable a$$hole who we are then supposed to believe does a complete 180 because after twenty-five years his wife's nagging suddenly takes effect. Um, no. I wished something interesting would happen: that the younger doctor would maybe refuse to return to the big city because he falls in love across class lines and is not as attached to his place of residence as his love object is attached to her small town, or that the Diane Keaton character, instead of her daughter, would run off with the young veterinarian -- stranger things have happened -- but no such luck.