El amor es extraño

OK. We have Ben & George, two gay men in their late 60s/early 70s,who have been together for almost 40 years. So far, so good. Finally they get married and as a result, George is fired and they find themselves having financial trouble, which forces them to sell their apartment and to move in with some friends (George) and some relatives (Ben).

The acting was OK, Ben and George really came across as a devoted couple, genuinely loving each other, and devoted to each other.

The rest was a bunch of nonsense.

Ben and George have been living together for almost 40 years. They do not seem to live the high life, or to be extremely extravagant. They have a nice apartment, comfortable, but not overly luxurious. Even their own wedding party is fairly simple: they did not even order a cab to the ceremony, but tried to find one on the streets. They did not throw a big party, or even have dinner with their friend and family in a restaurant, they just had some drinks at their own home. OK, they went on an expensive honeymoon, but if that is the only extravaganza they allowed themselves over all the years they were together, it is not over the top.

So all in all, they come across like people who have a simple lifestyle, do not overspend and are content with simple things.

Yet, when George is fired, they do not have a penny in the bank. Really? No savings, no insurances, nothing? That seems totally out of character.

But pennyless, they have to resort to moving in with friends/relatives. They do not seem to do any effort to stay together, if even in a single room. Just like that, after 40 years together, they decide to separate. George moves in with some neighbors (young gays), Ben goes to live with relatives (a young couple with a teenage son), where he has to share the room with this boy. Really?

Where did they leave all their stuff, their furniture, the paintings, the books? Did they just sell it all, or what?

Ben lives with those relatives, who seem wealthy enough (he is a businessman, she is a novelist), they have a maid, but they are still living in an apartment the size of a shoebox. Somehow, the only son has bunk beds in his room (why?), where Ben has to sleep. This son also has a friend, Vlad, with whom he spends hours and hours in his room. Why? Nobody knows.

Somehow, Ben, who is a painter, decides to make a picture of this Vlad on the roof top of the building. Why? He does not know this boy, he hardly has spoken to this boy, but somehow this boy Vlad agrees to pose for him. Does this make sense? No. Wouldn't it have made more sense for Ben to paint a picture of his nephew Joey on that roof top, which he than could have presented to the parents as a small "thank you" for taking him in?

In the mean time, George is living with this young gay couple, who are partying all the time, and meets a young guy. They get along very well, and somehow they end up having dinner together and looking at his apartment, which is for rent, as he is leaving for Mexico. Although they seem to have some sort of connection, no sexual attempts are made (really?) while they are alone in that apartment. It is mentioned that the rent is 1400 dollars a month, and somehow George suddenly has the means to pay that amount of money (earlier in the movie, George and Ben where house hunting and could not even afford 600 dollars...).

Than there is that whole issue about Joey and Vlad having stolen French literature books from the library. Really? Teen boys stealing Cyrano de Bergerac and other books like that? It is never explained why or how that ends, so what is the meaning of that?

And there are more issues that made this movie in itself a strange thing, the love between the two main characters was the most logic thing in the whole movie... SO no "Love is strange" here. But the rest was strange as hell.

Greetings again from the darkness. In a remarkable opening 6 to 8 minutes, we see John Lithgow and Alfred Molina prepare for, execute, and celebrate their official marriage after almost 40 years together. During this sequence, we quickly understand that Ben (Lithgow) is the emotional one, and George (Molina) is the pragmatic, balanced one. The brief ceremony is filled with love, admiration and happiness, and leaves us with no doubt that these two are dedicated to each other.

Director Ira Sachs (Married Life, 2007) also co-wrote the script with Mauricio Zacharias, and the film excels while Lithgow and Molina are on screen together. It comes across as a contemporary version of the 1937 Leo McCarey film Make Way For Tomorrow (with Beulah Bondi) and highlights the obstacles faced by an elderly couple who face financial hardships, New York real estate misery, and the not-so-welcome generosity of friends and family.

The gay component is not played up, rather the story is told in straight-forward manner as the couple is split up, and deals with loneliness and unease as they feel out of place living in a party house with friends (Molina) and sharing a bunk bed with a typically awkward teenage boy played by Charlie Tahan. The boy's parents are Marisa Tomei and Darren Burrows, who face their own marriage and parental issues.

The happiness of the opening wedding ceremony quickly dissipates into misery for all characters. The only happy people are the grown men playing a Game of Thrones board game. Literally everyone else is unhappy, or at least disinterested.

Although conflict is ever-present, the Catholic Church is the closest to a real villain. John Curran plays a Priest in the terrific scene in which Molina is fired (because of his wedding) from his Catholic School teaching job. The poor town of Poughkeepsie takes a couple of shots as well, but mostly it's the pent-up frustrations of Tomei, the passive-aggressive approach of a few other characters, and the crazy teenage mood swings of Tahan's character that keep Ben, George, and we as viewers quite uncomfortable. See this one for the performances of Lithgow and Molina, and for the beautiful Chopin piano throughout.

My partner and I were really looking forward to this movie - a story about a loving mature gay couple dealing with some harsh realities, played by some wonderful actors. While I found the acting to be generally good, the writing and direction were uneven and confusing. First the good: the two leads are wonderful and understated playing the gay couple who've been together for 39 years, now facing the realities of being temporarily homeless, and separated from each other. Now the bad: the whole premise of the movie, that this couple found it necessary to each find separate temporary living arrangements while trying to find a new apartment, stretched all credibility. I found this unbelievable, especially when they had the option to live together with a relative outside the city. For some reason, they felt it imperative to live separately in the city even though neither was now employed. The whole movie seems so contrived that it seems the writers chose almost any situation to advance the film so that it got to the ending that they had written, whether it made sense or not. The idea of two late 60s/early 70s men with no apparent savings/pension/income to be able to maintain their condo for at least a little while also stretched credibility - instead they selfishly share their predicament with relatives and friends and crash separately with them. The writers/director have created a story with so many holes and illogical story paths that I found myself annoyed and angry with the characters. John Lithgow's character seems oblivious to the fact that he is becoming an imposition to his nephew's family, especially to his nephew's young 15 year old son with whom he is sharing bunk beds. While I hardly expect everything in a movie to be sewn up neatly by the end, the writers introduced characters and story lines that the viewer was lead to believe mattered- but were dropped and never resolved. Who was the young boy's friend Vlad? What was behind the tension between the nephew and his wife? Why did Vlad and the young boy steal French lit books? What's up with the disco/party cops? Why the extended sob scene of the boy in the stairwell at the end? Has the movie become about him? A considerable time is spent on each of these items in the movie and yet there are no answers, and they don't seem relevant to what the story should have been about. A different director, one who was not also the writer, might have helped make this a better movie. I also couldn't help but think that this was a 2 hour movie that was cut to 90 minutes and the answers were left on the floor somewhere.

There is only one thing I didn't like about this film: the title. It's so bland. And it doesn't even have anything to do with what this film is about. It's not about a strange love affair, but about a very normal one.

Apart from that, I liked everything about 'Love is Strange'. It is a film about how people live, love, talk, help each other out, appreciate each other and sometimes work on each other's nerves. Maybe that doesn't sound too exciting, but it's enough to keep on watching, and be moved by what you see.

The film tells the story of an older couple, who are forced to leave their Manhattan apartment after one of them is fired from his teaching position. They temporarily move in with relatives and neighbours, until they have found a new place of their own. The film shows the interaction between civilized and polite people who are all perfectly willing to help each other, but nevertheless are increasingly annoyed by the uneasy situations caused by the arrangement.

Some scenes are funny in an understated way, and make you softly chuckle in your seat. Others are emotional, but never melodramatic. I think the word that best describes the general mood of the picture is 'heartfelt'. The director does a perfect job in balancing the emotions. Some scenes are very elongated and show little action, which gives an intense effect in combination with the wonderful and very prominent soundtrack consisting of piano pieces by Chopin. The music has a special meaning, because it is the music that one of the lead characters teaches his piano pupils.

The couple is gay, but that doesn't really matter. The film could just as well have been about a straight couple, with some minor script changes. But the couple fits in perfectly in the liberal, open minded, intellectual New York circles where the movie is set. (The sort of people who think it's almost impossible to survive in Poughkeepsie when you're used to Manhattan). In fact, those are exactly the same circles Woody Allen prefers for his films, and sometimes 'Love is Strange' reminded me of Allen's best films, like 'Blue Jasmine', minus the usual neurotic behaviour by the lead characters.

My wife and I were both moved and touched by this sweet sad drama of romance near the end of life's long and winding road. When a couple really complete each other's life it is a joy even when things turn rougher because that very important someone is there, next to you to divide the sorrows and multiply the joys.

But when circumstances beyond their control force them to separate briefly friends and families who offered to help become tested, tried and like most of us will fail at some point.

We are big fans of John Lithgow (we grew up near his home town and he's a local legend) and the great Alfred Molina and Marisa Tomei. The script, direction and performances were all like the music and art used in the film – wonderfully filling in all the colors of life.

As for it being a remake, the great comedy director Leo McCarey (Laurel & Hardy films, the Cary Grant screwball comedy The Awful Truth, An Affair To Remember, etc.) wanted to make a film about the problems of old age. Here is the plot description of Make Way For Tomorrow (1937), "At a family reunion, the Cooper clan find that their parents' home is being foreclosed. "Temporarily," Ma moves in with son George's family, Pa with daughter Cora. But the parents are like sand in the gears of their middle-aged children's well regulated households. As the days become weeks and then months, everyone gets stretched until they must except being separated permanently and go out for one last fling before saying goodbye forever."

Both films are wonderful dramas that ask us to treat each other with more compassion and civility – and to be prepared for the end.

Leo McCarey was nominated for an Oscar eight times and when he won Best Director in 1937 for The Awful Truth in his acceptance speech he said thank you but it was for the wrong film (meaning he thought he should have won for the more important feature Make Way For Tomorrow.)

I recommend seeing them both and then go and hug everyone you know and cherish while you can.