The Good Wife (1987)

Unbridled passions sear under the hot Australian sun in this smoldering tale of desperation, betrayal and redemption. Breathtakingly beautiful to watch, this "well made and well acted" (Leonard Maltin) drama stars Rachel Ward (Against All Odds), Bryan Brown (Cocktail) and Sam Neill (Jurassic Park) in a haunting story of lost opportunities and unrequited love. Marge (Ward), a sensuous but proper wife, lives with her quiet lumberjack husband Sonny (Brown) in a remoteAussie town. Lonely and unfulfilled, Marge develops an attractionand then an obsessionfor thetown's sexy new bartender, Neville (Neill). And when Neville acts on Marge's desires, he unleashes her insatiable sexual appetite. But word of her infidelity catches and spreads like wildfire throughtheir small town leaving Sonny with no choice but to squelch the flames or lose everything he's got!

The Good Wife=bad

I dont see how this movie got anything over 2 stars. It was just plain odd. The phsycho wife sleeps with her husbands goofy, childish brother because "one man is like any other" in her opinion. It is obvious that the husband (the only character that I cared even a little about)is hurt by her willingness to sleep with his brother but says OK because its what his wife wants. Then, the wife see's Sam Niell, whom I could not find one thing attractive about, and becomes obsessed with him to the point where she leaves her home and faithful, ever patient husband, and moves into town to stalk this bartenders every move 24 hours a day from across the street. The ending was almost fitting, I just wish the train had run over her and that her husband would move on to a woman who deserved him. May 11, 2007

The Good Wife (could be better)

Set in 1939 in Australia, a woman (Rachel Ward) is mostly happily married to a good provider, but is bored in bed. She falls for a local bartender (Sam Neill), who seems to be the Lothario type. But when she literally throws herself at him, he tosses her away. Her doggedly faithful husband takes her back. The potential for something really excellent is here, but nothing comes of it. The characters are too zombie-like to prompt us very much to care about them. March 26, 2005

One of Bryan's and Rachel's Best

It is not often that a married couple makes a decent movie together. Think Eyes Wide Shut. But this movie has the chemistry to make that exception happen. Bryan and Rachel were not even this sexy together in the Thorn Birds, and it is because here she is more the villianous one than he is. Most of the movie is fine (they have been married for 20 years), and this probably echoes their real life. Add Steven Vidler as Sugar and Sam Neill as Neville, and the plot thickens. Sugar decides to move in, and wants to gain experience by sleeping with Marge (Rachel). The thing is that Sonny (Bryan) is so intent on making his wife happy, he does not even really bat an eyelash over it. When Neville comes to town to be the new bartender and seduces Marge right after he gets off the train, she turns him down. The rest is what makes the movie the thriller it is. If you are expecting Sonny and Marge to echo Luke and Meggie, you will be let down. I think this part is more real, especially for Bryan, who shows the audience that if this film does echo his marriage with Rachel (aside from the infedility), it is easy to see why they are still happily married after 20 years. June 25, 2004

Sexy Rachel Ward plays naughty wife

This little potboiler was made after Bryan Brown and Rachel Ward became a couple. They had met on the set of The Thorn Birds and continued their chemistry into real life. Following the tradition of many acting couples (Welles and Hayworth, Burton and Taylor, Cruise and Kidman, among others), they decided to make a movie together. This is always risky, considering stinkbombs like Gigli, but The Good Wife is actually a fairly good movie.
It's set in small town Australia around the 1930s or so. Brown plays the kind of role he's best at - a roughneck farmer type. His wife (Ward) is sort of resigned to her lot in life till she bumps into the new man in town, a suave drifter (Sam Neill). He gets a job as barman of the local tavern and starts bedding the local women, married or not. But he ignores Ward, much to her dismay. She becomes infatuated and makes a fool of herself.
Thrown into this mix is the subplot in which Brown gives his farmhand (and brother if I remember correctly) permission to have sex with his wife while Brown is in the other room. There's little nudity, but Rachel Ward is the hottest she's ever been, even in a naive, awkward way. February 26, 2004

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