Used People (1992)

A magnificent idea supported on an uneven script!

Once more, we will have the immense pleasure to watch two legends of the cinema in the peak of its creativeness. The versatile Shirley MacLaine plays the role of a recent Jewish widowed and the well educated Italian gentleman, who also lost his wife.

Nevertheless, this autumnal romance really lacks of a true narrative vertebral column and from time to time yields us to effective vignettes, that work out as a tongue in the cheek. You should remind for instance "Moonstruck" to understand plainly the problem to deal with a heavy-handed script bounded with a magnificent and a superior cast.

Fresh and funny but ultimately disappointing.
December 23, 2007

I want my DVD!

I've loved this film for years and just came on Amazon to put it on my wish list, when to my horror I realized that it's not available on DVD! What gives?! I WANT MY DVD! August 14, 2007

Brings Back Memories

Please release a DVD! This beautiful film truly captures the essence of a New York family in the 60s. Great casting, great talent, great acting and beautiful photography make this film likely to make those of us who experienced this time period in NY very sentimental. October 27, 2006

Inspiring Movie

At her husband's funeral, a Jewish woman (Shirley MacLaine) is approached by an Italian man (Marcello Mastroianni). After offering his condolences he asks her on a date. She accepts just to shock her sister and mother-in-law who are watching over her with their instructions of what she can and cannot do. On their first date, for coffee, she learns that 25 years ago her husband was going to leave her but was talked out of it by the man who sits before her. He's waited all this time for her to be free. She doesn't know how to deal with information so she deserts him. He's not easily discouraged and positions himself in her life affecting both her and the members of her family.

This story is about life after death and how the death of a loved one affects those left behind; in particular, the wife and her two daughters and their children. Shirley MacLaine is excellent as the bitter widow who laid down her life for her husband and children and now that her husband is gone and her children are grown and on their own she isn't too sure what to do with herself.

Kathy Bates plays an overweight waitress with two children of her own and wears her pain on her sleeve while her Marcia Gay Harden plays her sister, a bank clerk who dresses up like different movie stars to cover up her pain. Marcia makes a hot Marilyn Monroe and Anne Bancroft. She has a son who things he's Superman and is grieving over another child that died. Both women gave stellar performances.

The costumes, food, funeral, wedding and family dinners are just window dressing for this gripping story about coming to terms with aging and the loneliness associated with both loss of love and loss of who they use to be. But it's also a celebration of the time remaining and finding a reason to celebrate each day. It was longish in parts and sometimes it was hard to understand what Mastroianni was saying but overall an inspiring movie. November 26, 2005

I WANT MY DVD!

Touching, romantic, comedic, satiric, sad...and that's just Marsha Gay Harden's character! THIS MOVIE SHOULD BE RELEASED ON DVD NOW! August 12, 2005

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