NekoHomey Purely Joyful Movie!

CommentsXp Best movie ever!

Allison Davies The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

Kaelan Mccaffrey Like the great film, it's made with a great deal of visible affection both in front of and behind the camera.

SnoopyStyle Ten year old Casey Brodsky (Drew Barrymore) seeks emancipation from her parents Albert (Ryan O'Neal) and Lucy (Shelley Long). Her divorced parents do not get along. The testimonies lead to recollections of earlier times. She reluctantly picks up hitchhiking Albert on a rainy night. She's marrying Bink but marries Albert instead. He's a UCLA film professor. Hollywood producer David Kessler (Sam Wanamaker) hires him and she becomes his writing partner. He directs a smash hit. He hires ingénue newcomer Blake Chandler (Sharon Stone) for his next movie leading to their divorce. Albert loses everything making a flop with Blake while Lucy gains success as a children book writer.Written by married couple Nancy Meyers and Charles Shyer, this is Hollywood married life with all the ups and downs. Drew Barrymore is actually the supporting actress. This is more about the pairing between O'Neal and Long. They have to sell their chemistry and their relationship. It's passable but it could be better. It needs more humor especially in the first half. The second half has the needed heartbreak. The climatic moment when the couple is literally pulling Casey apart is very effective.

Isaac5855 Writing team Charles Shyer and Nancy Meyers scored a bullseye with IRRECONCILABLE DIFFERENCES, a surprisingly smart and amusing comedy that blended the family dysfunction comedy with the "inside Hollywood" type of comedy and the results is quite entertaining. Our story begins with 10-year old KC Brotzky (Drew Barrymore)arriving in a Los Angeles courtroom where she is suing for emancipation from her divorced parents,filmmakers Albert and Lucy Brotzky (Ryan O'Neal and Shelley Long). The film then flashes back to the beginning of Albert and Lucy's relationship,showcasing the first smash hit film they made together, followed by another film during which Albert has an affair with the leading lady (Sharon Stone,very funny in one of her earliest roles)and how the making of this film tore Albert and Lucy apart. Albert and his new love then make a "Gone With the Wind"-type spectacular that bombs at the box office and things just go from bad to worse with poor little KC caught in the middle and tired of being a bargaining chip between her parents. O'Neal delivers what is probably the best performance of his career and Long is a good match for him. Aided by a deft screenplay, O'Neal, Long, and Barrymore deliver a nearly forgotten gem here which delivers warm family laughs and takes accurate potshots at Hollywood as well.

timtindy Irreconcilable Differences is one of the best movies of the 80s and quite possibly the most underrated love story ever made. For whatever reason, audiences chose to ignore this well-written and well-acted gem in 1984. I think it may have been due to the marketing campaign -- they tried to sell it as a cutesy gimmick movie where a precocious child "divorces" her parents. But that isn't what this movie is about at all. This movie is able to provide strong commentary about failed relationships, especially when egos, power, and greed substitute for the things that should really matter in a person's life. In addition, it creates a viable love story that doesn't resort to typical Hollywood formulas when it creates the conflicts that may or may not separate these two people who we know belong with each other. We the audience get to see them actually fall in love on the screen before our very eyes. You would think this should be fairly standard, but how many movies can you recall (especially recently) that you can say that about? This is done through great acting, writing, and directing. Notice how Shelley Long's voice changes over the years as she goes through the various changes in her life. Watch Ryan O'Neal's eyes toward the end as you can actually see an inner peace that he never had earlier.These are just a few of the great things I loved about this great, heartwarming, and underappreciated film. If you want a great love story with some very good comic and dramatic moments as well, rent this movie! You won't regret it.

moonspinner55 Say what you will about the Shyer-Meyers team ("Private Benjamin", "Father Of The Bride", "Baby Boom"), they know how to craft a movie, often exploiting every ounce of sentiment from their scripts. "Irreconcilable Differences" is somewhat of a departure for them however, a depiction of neurotic movie people, denizens of Hollywood, who have hardly any good points. As soon as the young couple finds success, it's a rich road downhill. The plot set-up has youngster Drew Barrymore trying to emancipate herself away from her famous mom and dad, and the H-Wood high-life is shown as both cause and effect. A terrific sequence involving Sharon Stone in a quasi-musical version of "Gone With The Wind" is satiric comic genius, yet the movie is so hard on its players, so brittle and tough, it's difficult to shake off the bad vibes even as the third act winds down to a sunny conclusion. Perceptively, the screenplay includes many awful (and awfully funny) truths about marriage, money and careers, but the cynical undermining of the picture may put fluff-oriented viewers off. ***1/2 from ****