Senteur
As somebody who had not heard any of this before, it became a curious phenomenon to sit and watch a film and slowly have the realities begin to click into place.
Jonah Abbott
There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.
Paynbob
It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.
Michael_Elliott
The Odd Couple II (1998) ** 1/2 (out of 4) Thirty (!!!) years after the original film, Felix (Jack Lemmon) and Oscar (Walter Matthau) find themselves thrown back together as they must take a road trip to their children's wedding. THE ODD COUPLE II should have been called GRUMPIEST OLD MEN because it has much more in common with GRUMPY OLD MEN than it does the original 1968 film. In fact, as a sequel this movie is quite bad because it's really not the same characters as before and the entire mood is different but if you go into this expecting another dirty-talking old man movie then you should at least get enough laughs to make it worth sitting through. Once again all the magic is due to Lemmon and Matthau who still have that wonderful chemistry together. The two of them were certainly among the greatest comedy actors out there and when they're together they're even more special. The screenplay here really just puts them in one comedic situation after another and I'll admit that none of it is all that original. There's even a rather lazy sequence in a small town where the two just keep getting arrested over and over. I don't think this happens because of great writing but instead because they needed to pump out the running time so they just kept repeating the same type of joke. The film starts off as a road picture and I think these sequences get the biggest laughs as it relates most to the original film as Oscar has to put up with the various annoying things that Felix does. The film certainly has some major problems including the screenplay that just doesn't do much and instead just has a bunch of cussing and fighting between the two men. Yes, at times it's funny but by 1998 we had already seen it in the two GRUMPY OLD MEN films as well as OUT TO SEA. Still, if you're a fan of the two legends then there's no question you'll still want to check this out even if it falls short of their best films.
gavin6942
Oscar's son is marrying Felix's daughter... and the "odd couple" will now be traveling across California to try and find the wedding. But anything that can go wrong will go wrong when you're dealing with these grumpy old men.Normally, I don't think you wait 30 years to make a sequel... but they did it (probably setting some kind of record). And, you know, I liked this film. I watched it with my brother and my father, and I found it to be a good film for a family to watch (but an older family, because the language is a little bad). It's funny in a more or less clean way (no smut) and it's a no-brainer film (just more of Mathau and Lemmon tearing into each other).I liked some of the jokes more than others ("the crutch store" is pretty funny) and a lot of it was sort of cheesy. But it's also cute to see two old men try to pick up women half their age and get stranded in a desert. That's just so silly -- old men! Old men, who aren't timid, with no secrets.That's really all I can say about this one. It's just like watching "Grumpy Old Men", but it's in California rather than in the woods. Otherwise ,it may as well be the same film. Which works. Because unlike other films that seem to be copies of themselves, this has more of a "Laurel and Hardy" or "Abbott and Costello" feel where you can't imagine these old men doing anything differently. Check it out for an easy laugh.
Bill Slocum
"Getting old is not for sissies," Bette Davis once said, and here's the proof. What could be funnier than Oscar Madison and Felix Ungar decrying their decrepitude and swearing at each other? A lot of things, including every other movie script Neil Simon ever wrote.Rejoining the two principals of "The Odd Couple" 30 years later, Oscar (Walter Matthau) and Felix (Jack Lemmon) haven't seen much of each other since Oscar threw Felix out of his apartment at the end of the first movie, regardless of anything you remember seeing on television. Now they are forced back together when Oscar's son and Felix's daughter prepare to marry in California's San Something-or-other. Oscar and Felix's failure to remember the name of the town is pretty much the story line here, as they get stranded in the desert wastes of California.It's a strangely bitter Neil Simon comedy, the harshest he ever wrote, including that much better one set in a boot camp. Everything seems to be aimed at laughs, except the jokes leave a uniformly sour aftertaste. "Your hair got whiter, your ears got bigger, your nose got longer, but you still retain that unique, elusive pain-in-the-ass quality that drives me berserk," Oscar announces at the outset. Or, later on, in the heat of another argument: "I'm too old to hit, but I could spit you to death."Lemmon and Matthau look terrible; "The Odd Couple II" was their last film together. Three short years later, both actors would be gone. That makes the age cracks all the sadder. Did Simon think the characters would be funnier if Felix dropped a couple of F-bombs, or if Oscar's once-masculine-Manhattan poker games were played in a Florida retirement community where grandmas nosh on cottage cheese?I'm a big fan of the TV series that starred Jack Klugman and Tony Randall; the film tries to pretend all that never happened. I might have resented that a bit but it makes sense. The characters in the film and TV series were very different; Felix's last name was even spelt differently. The fact these guys in the film never met Paul Williams is therefore not a point to resent; I instead appreciated the set designer here who cleverly inserted a Yahtzee game in Oscar's condo - Yahtzee being a game that owed its success to being marketed on TV by Klugman and Randall.The problem with this film is that it makes no sense on its own terms. It is a sequel without any idea behind it, except Lemmon and Matthau were still making successful movies together in the 1990s and "The Odd Couple" had been their most successful movie together. The idea of them forced together by their kids' marrying might be funnier if more was done, say the kids' displaying some of their fathers' most unpleasant qualities, maybe in reverse. But the film keeps its focus on Matthau and Lemmon, who seem ill and uncomfortable throughout.Simon tries to shake things up in the second half by getting Felix and Oscar involved with a pair of middle-aged biker chicks who throw themselves at Oscar. You might call them the "Vulture Sisters," as opposed to the Pigeon Sisters. There's also an even older man who takes Felix and Oscar on a ride, only to die en route.These are the jokes, folks, a sad end to a fun story. I much prefer thinking of Matthau and Lemmon's characters bickering in a Manhattan apartment, eating salty foods, and not in any danger of shuffling their mortal coil anytime soon. Do the same and skip this film.
theowinthrop
It is hard to believe it was only eight years ago that this, the last of the Lemmon and Matthau (or Matthau and Lemmon) films was made, and within four years both stars would be gone. One only wishes that their last film together had been more of a success. They had done first rate sequels before with GRUMPIER OLD MEN, but that film had been done within two years of GRUMPY OLD MEN, and a natural momentum carried the stars (and supporting casts) to the finish line. That is not the case with THE ODD COUPLE II. It came out thirty years after the original THE ODD COUPLE, and while they are reunited with the play's creator (Neil Simon) on the screenplay, the momentum - the push - is lacking.Not that this is a boring film. Far from it. We always wondered how Oscar Madison and Felix Unger would have behaved as elderly men. Of course, Felix looked like he and Gloria were going to settle their differences and return together in the first play/movie. Indeed, in the television series Tony Randall did get back to his wife. But here it is obvious it did not work at all. Both men have remained divorced, and both men remain essential the same: Felix the compulsively organized neatnik and Oscar the incorrigible slob. They also have given each other a wide birth if possible. But they find themselves drawn back into mutual orbit. Oscar's son is getting married - and to Felix's daughter. So the pair are headed for the wedding, and that means jointly showing up.What happens is a series of joint misadventures on the way to the wedding, especially involving two rather fun young women that they meet (Christine Baranski and Jean Smart) with their jealous boyfriends. This leads to several, increasingly odd, run-ins with the sheriff of a small town they can't seem to successfully leave. Indeed, in one case they get a lift out of town in a beautiful white classic Rolls Royce, which moves more slowly than a pair of people on bicycles.The situations are all quite amusing. But the unity of the film is not there - it is like a series of skits involving Felix and Oscar, that are vaguely united because the two characters are familiar to us, and they are supposed to get to the wedding. Still the two stars give it their all, and with Baranski, Smart, and the late Bernard Hughes it works well enough as an entertainment. But for me, the wackiness and variety of OUT TO SEA make that film a better final film for the pair.
