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Boynton Beach Club
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by Sony Pictures
Sales Rank: 17665
Price: $13.49
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Recently widowed Marilyn (Brenda Vaccaro), still reeling over the sudden death of her husband, finds an unexpected new circle of friends when she accepts an invitation to join The Boynton Beach Bereavement Club. While not ready to embark on a relationship herself, she is amused to realize that many of her contemporaries are actively looking for love. Lois (Dyan Cannon) is being courted by a younger man (Michael Nouri), while Harry (Joseph Bologna) tries internet dating and encourages his friend Jack (Len Cariou) to pursue a romance with the mysterious Sandy (Sally Kellerman). The Boynton Beach Club proves that 60 IS the new 40 and you’re never too old to fall in love.
Viewer Reviews
Give director/co-screenwriter Susan Seidelman (Gaudi Afternoon) credit for focusing on a segment sadly neglected in current cinema, single sixty-somethings facing lives without their lifetime partners. There is a gentle, loping quality to this seriocomic 2006 character-driven comedy, but it also doesn't feel quite substantial enough to provide genuine insight into their difficult situations. The various storylines rarely feel more complex than an episode of The Golden Girls, but the principal actors - some rarely seen outside of guest appearances on reruns of Murder, She Wrote - compensate to a great degree.
There are three plot threads that intertwine over the course of the movie. Long-married Marilyn faces an unexpected tragedy when her exercise-obsessed husband is killed by a thoughtless woman backing her car out of a driveway. She decides to join the Boynton Beach Bereavement Club (the movie's original title) upon the prodding of Lois, a still-sexy, flirtatious interior decorator who is the unofficial social leader of the club. As Marilyn faces her anger and loneliness, Lois finds herself drawn to Donald, a younger man whom she believes is a real estate tycoon. Also in the club is Harry, who fancies himself a ladies' man and wants to help Jack, newly widowed and prime bait for the widows in the retirement community. Jack isn't ready to date until he meets Sandy, a very interested woman who isn't quite what she claims. Harry, on the other hand, tries online dating, but he finds trouble with the woman who seems like the ideal match for him.
It's nice to see actors who gained prominence in the late 1960's and early 1970's receive substantive roles in their autumnal years. Brenda Vaccaro (Midnight Cowboy) as Marilyn and Len Cariou (The Four Seasons) as Jack deliver the strongest performances because their characters undergo the grief and recovery of losing a loved one. Vaccaro has two particularly compelling scenes - the first where Marilyn introduces herself to the club and cannot conceal the rage over her husband's death, the second when Marilyn finally faces the woman who ran her husband over. Dyan Cannon (Bob and Carol and Ted and Alice) as Lois and Joseph Bologna as Harry (My Favorite Year) primarily provide comic relief. Both are as likeable as ever, though it's rather disheartening to see Cannon so surgically altered. The same is true of Sally Kellerman (M*A*S*H) who has to play the concealed Sandy close to the vest. As Donald, Michael Nouri (Flashdance) plays a character with secrets of his own as he pursues Lois. Seidelman's thoughtful commentary is the only extra on the 2007 DVD.
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Boynton Beach Club
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