Up the Sandbox

Probably the best Barbra Streisand movie nobody has ever seen, director Irvin Kershner's expose of urban angst is funny and sad but ultimately uplifting. Streisand plays a NYC housewife, sick to death of her disengaged husband, impossible mother, and overall lack of confidence. She finds release in fantasies: one moment she's frolicking with a very surprising Fidel Castro and the next she's helping to blow up the Statue of Liberty. Streisand has rarely been better. Director Kershner gets a very toned down performance out of her. David Selby, as the husband, is duly caddish and Paul Benedict, Conrad Bain and Isabel Sanford have small roles. Benedict is particularly funny as an especially inept great white hunter!

In this small, unknown gem from 1972, Barbra Streisand plays Margaret Reynolds. Margaret is a bored housewife who wishes to do more than what her life holds for her. She has two children and a loving husband Paul (played by "Dark Shadows'" David Selby,) but its not enough. She finds out that she is carrying a third child and is scared of what might happen when she tells Paul. He feels the world is overcrowded as it is and that it would be wrong to bring another child into it. So, Margaret escapes into her fantasy life. The fantasies range from confronting the woman whom she believes is sleeping with her husband (good scene,) to interviewing Fidel Castro (which ultimatelky unvails his "secreet,") to slamming her mother's face into an anniversary cake!

All in all, the film is incredible. The only negative aspect would be the loss of so many scenes which leads the viewer to sometimes take a moment to catch back up with the fact that she is in her fantasy world. Not quite as gritty as the novel (not once does she mention wanting to leave her son at the playground or drop him on his head!,) but still a definite must see.

Overall rating: A-

This film is one of those 70's efforts that doesn't get any great credence. Any fan of Ally McBeal would surely tip their hats to the blend of imagination and reality. This has some very prophetic moments and still stands up today. It is testament to a time when risks were taken in film making rather than today's option of remakes and rewrites. Top marks for originality and Streisand. Give it a chance. May all your films be winners - AP

"Up the Sandbox" could be a bigger classic if it had a better development of its ideas while telling the near-crazed ramblings of a neurotic housewife (Barbra Streisand) who has an emotional breakdown that shelters her from reality, shifting from delusional grandiosity to the real chaos of dealing with husband (David Selby), kids, a dominating mother (Jane Hoffman), and helpless friends. Irvin Kershner's film doesn't have a fine balance between comedy and drama, and we depend so much on an unreliable and frustrated lead character that there are times it's difficult to know what exactly does she want from life and relationships, what's real and what's not. I'd like to imagine what Woody Allen would turn if having the chance to direct this material (pity he only deals with his own material).

It's not a total mess since there are noble messages intertwined through it all, and there are moments of true brilliance (the exchange between Barbra and her husband's lover was hilarious as both women accept the fact of one another), wild mayhem (Fidel Castro becoming a female with a world domination where women rule the world), and pure outrageous fun (her parents anniversary being ruined because she refused to give the only thing her mother wanted in order to be truly happy).

If the lady's wildest dreams are fun to watch despite some nightmarish bits, the reality of it all is unappealing and nothing gets solved.

The film's idea seems to defend that once a woman gets married her dreams and wishes are inexistent as she needs to accomodate her family before herself, and to fight such notion are pointless and selfish acts. Her only comfort comes from dreams where she rejects the possibility of having a third kid, or finding solutions to improve the female cause, or commit a random terrorist attack on the Statue of Liberty. We keep waiting, with anxious hopes, that one day she'll wake up and finally act, do something different. But at the end of it all, there's no pay-off to her situation and it's frustrating - sure it can be said it was a realistic portrayal of its period and that audiences of then should know how to change such scenario.

By itself, I tried to like it but couldn't. If comparing a key scenario, the theme was better presented in "Diary of a Mad Housewife" (to Kerhsner's film disadvantage, I saw the other film a few days earlier and it stayed in my head). A few points from that film: worst husband, worst kids and the woman's little relief was having an affair with a careless chauvinist lover. Here, Barbra's dream of another man in her life comes with the presence of a charming university teacher and even that slight chance of affair is ruined because his date invitation for both was attending the Castro political meeting where she cried against his revolution. Had not seen "Diary of..." it might impact less the difficulties I had with this one, and it'd become something manageable.

Fine performances all around, but nothing so outstanding that requires new viewers to it. You won't be missing much, except for the really funny sequences. 5/10.

This is a top 70's flick and highly underrated. I can imagine that it caused a stir in its release and still puts some viewers off. If David E. Kelley didn't get ideas for Ally McBeal from this, I'll go hee! Wonderful performance by Babs and hits the mark nicely.