Oggi sposi: sentite condoglianze

The title of the film comes from a story told in drawings - The War Between Men and Women - whose author was the famous American humorist, James Thurber (1894-1961). Thurber's most famous work is the short story "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty" which was made into a movie starring Danny Kaye in 1947. A new version of "Mitty" is in production.

The character of Peter Wilson played by Jack Lemmon in this film suffers from failing eyesight which also plagued Thurber and contributed to his unique drawing style. This film was probably inspired by William Windom's portrayal of a Thurber-like character in a TV series broadcast in 1969 called My World and Welcome To It which is a title of one of Thurber's books. Windom went on to do a one-man stage performance of Thurber's works including some animation of some of Thurber's drawings. At the end of The War Between Men and Women we see one of these animations, an anti-war piece by Thurber called "The Last Flower".

I remember the time period when this movie came out. I never got to see the film at that time, which is too bad, because I liked the 1969 William Windom series, "My World, and Welcome To It." Both had roots in James Thurber, and both used live action and animation.

OK, so maybe this isn't Jack Lemmon's greatest movie. And I suppose it would not resonate with audiences in 21st century America. But you had to be there to really understand.

As it is, both Jack Lemmon and Lisa Gerritsen give great performances, and Jason Robards' appearance is always welcome. This is not a movie for everyone, but it is well worth a watch!!!

A few weeks ago, I accidentally stumbled into the beginning-after the credits-of this movie while flipping channels. Since it was late, I didn't bother to watch the rest of it so when I found it in the listings again a few days later, I immediately time recorded it on the DVR. I'm very glad I did as I was enthralled by Jack Lemmnon's performance as a cartoonist who's going blind and, despite his cynical attitude concerning women and children, meets a lady (Barbara Harris) with three kids that he falls for as her temper matches his to a T! There's also her ex-husband (Jason Robards) to deal with whenever he comes to visit. Of the offspring, the most charismatic is the middle one played by Lisa Gerritsen-perhaps best known as Phyllis' daughter on both "The Mary Tyler Moore Show" and the spin off "Phyllis"-who has a speech impediment. As Lemmon's character is based on real life cartoonist James Thurber, we see drawings and animation by Playhouse Pictures that is directly inspired by his work including a perfect rendering of his picture tale called "The Last Flower". To me, The War Between Men and Women is both hilarious and very dramatically touching so on that note, this movie is highly recommended.

This movie is based on Thurber's book and his life, it's funny but very touching, like James Thurber himself. Of course Thurber's absurdest humor is not everyone's cup of tea, and much of this movie was over the audiences head. As usual the almost forgotten Barbra Harris is perfect, funny pretty and just a bit mad. When this movie came out there was a TV show on at the same time based on the same work. It was called "My World & Welcome to It" Lisa Gerritsen played the daughter in both . What seems to annoy many people who see this movie is the use of Thurbers cartoons. And I admit it took me a while to finally get the humor in his cartoon strips. so, although this may only be a film for Thurber fans , it is an excellent one.

Unless you are trying to see all of Jack Lemmon's films you should probably skip this film. Lemmon plays an almost blind cartoonist who is getting progressively worse. He has a weird relationship with Barbara Harris's character. She was formerly married to Jason Robards. The movie is not funny though it is supposed to be a comedy. It didn't really have any point or redeeming feature. 3 out of 10.