Sweet Hearts Dance

Sweet Hearts Dance is a real good movie, It stars Don Johnson and Susan sarandon as a married couple and its about how thier marriage falls appart over the year and it shows them from holiday to holiday. Its a real good movie and kind of sad because thier seperation effects thier 3 kids (one of whom is played by Charmeds Holly Marie Combs)

I remember going to see this movie as an afterthought one night in 1988 when I was on a business trip to San Diego. I thought at first it was going to stink, as I couldn't imagine Don Johnson handling a thoughtful adult role. I was shocklingly surprised at his, and the always superior Jeff Daniels acting in this film. These two guys played off each other with such chemistry it was hard not to imagine them as best friends. As a guy who hasn't had much luck in the relationship department, I could so relate to both Don and Jeff's romance problems with, respectively; Susan Sarandon, and the babe-a-licious (I still have the hots for her) Elizabeth Perkins. In addition to the outstanding acting, the movie was written and directed with a great deal of heart. Its such a shame this fine film was ignored at the box office.

Sweet Hearts Dance has a good cast of actors. Don Johnson was in a very popular period, Susan Sarandon doesn't need an introduction, and Jeff Daniels came from the success of "Purple rose of Cairo" and "Something wild". There were all the elements to be a good movie: an interesting subject (family divorce), the actors, a good screenwriter Ernest Thompson, who came from the copy of Academy Awarded winner "On the golden pond", but the movie failed the waits. The screenplay is very repetitive: it seems to be taken from a reduction of "Terms of endearment" (even Elizabeth Perkins phisically looks like Debra Winger) and from a series of similar movies. Don Johnson is very good in the part of the rebellious husband with a bad character but we don't understand where his intolerance comes. The movie doesn't explain this and expires in the usual stereotype of the couple in crisis after the first 15 years of marriage. The direction is so absent that often it doesn't understand if the actors improvise in order to give speed to the scenes or it was a decision of the screenwriter to think many slow and predictable scenes. However the story presents even very funny moments that are the only reason in order to see this movie.

"Sweet Hearts Dance" is about a two couples...one married, one not. Beyond that there's little worth mentioning. Although the film sports a good cast and is an okay production, it is a movie in need of a story as it wanders from chapter to chapter exploring the vicissitudes of a quartet of people who are probably much less interesting that yourself. In a word....boring.

This is quite a surprise -- a real charmer of a movie. Who knew that Don Johnson and Susan Sarandon could co-exist in the same movie -- and play so well? And with Elizabeth Perkins and Jeff Daniels, the charm and the good looks just ooze off the screen.