Dad (1989) Reviews

• Very emotional

  casey_choas662002-07-08

  This movie hits, it hits very hard. No one is let off easy in this film about an old man (played to perfection by Jack Lemmon) who has his wife do everything for him. BUt his wife has a heart attack and is put in the hospital. His son (Ted Danson) has to return home to take care of his father. What comes from there is an adventure that will warm you heart as fast as it will break it. Jack Lemmon is very believeable as the father that you will believe that he actually is 85 years old and Ten Danson has never been better in a film. This film devlves into hard topics such as divorce, marraige and family relationships and none of these subjects are delt with lightly and is sure to bring a tear to the eye of everyone whether you can realte to these characters or not.

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• this remains a powerful film

  wisewebwoman2001-11-09

  I think this is Jack Lemmon's greatest performance and the supporting cast are incredible, including Ted Danson who always appears to me to be slightly frenetic in a grim kind of way. Here he is truly believable and his scenes with his own son tug at your heart they are so real. No Hollywood quickfix here for the relationship, the boy is simply closer to his grandfather than he is to his own father and nothing will change that fact. What I liked most about the film was that the theme in less worthy hands could have been made sloppily sentimental, but here it is totally restrained both in script and direction and it makes for a really meaningful movie. The characters remain real all the way through and the script does not transform them into wondrous saints by movie's end. It is the wonderful understatement in it all that captivated me and made me weep at the end. Jack is truly unforgettable and Olympia magnificent in her dryness and cynicism. I have seen it 3 times and each time relished another scene a little more. This time around it was Jack dragging his wife around to meet the neighbours he was not even aware of before and her long suffering face at this new and reinvented Jack makes you laugh out loud. Bravo to all. An 8 1/2 out of 10. And that scene where they dance, oh me oh my......who needs naked bodies writhing on a bed, this has sensuousness, love and intimacy in it, the real kind. Oh for more of those scenes in movies!

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• Solid Story-Telling.

  tfrizzell2002-07-06

  Genuine tear-jerker that has the elderly Olympia Dukakis falling ill and leaving husband Jack Lemmon in limbo. Dukakis has done all the work in the relationship and Lemmon is helpless, plain and simple. Son Ted Danson comes to the rescue though and Dukakis starts to recover slowly. However trouble looms as Lemmon will be diagnosed with cancer and go into an emotional tail-spin that could kill him. A sappy screenplay works to near perfection here and steady direction helps the film's cause as well. Watch for a young Ethan Hawke as Lemmon's grandson. Heart-wrenching and heart-warming at the same time. 4 stars out of 5.

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• One of the best family films

  r2a012922006-01-28

  Life is sometimes a hard thing. People must learn what is the most important thing in life. This film shows us how we must to face a critical situation. Perhaps when time is gone we try to recall that time too late. The family is the most important thing we have. The Film : I think it's very crude and real. there are many old ones in abandonment situation and this film illustrates the necessary love for the greater ones of the family. Although TV is treated in format, the argument either is developed and distributed in the time with a crescendo of emotions very well displayed. Jack Lemmon makes a magnificent work in Jake Tremont roll with such so pathetic depth that it seems real Ted Danson is discovered like a good actor, not only for series of television, but also for cinema too. He plays more than credible son dedicated to his father treating to compensate the lack of affection felt in both directions in the past times

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• I admit. I initially only wanted to watch Dad to see a younger Ethan

  jemps9182008-01-01

  I admit. I initially only wanted to watch Dad to see a younger Ethan Hawke. Fifteen minutes into the film, I was bawling my eyes out. This is unusual for me, as I'm not exactly the weepy type and I only usually cry in tearjerkers featuring Old Yeller, Fluke and Free Willy (somehow, animals emote more convincingly). I thought Dad would be a boring, heartwarming drama, but I pleasantly discovered that it had its share of laughs. This movie is excellently cast and well written. It jars the senses long after you've seen it because it forces you to face things you'd rather not deal with, ever, but will inevitably have to: losing someone you love. The film opens with a young Jack Lemmon at sunrise, starting work at his ranch with his beautiful, supportive wife and kids. Then, a sequence to establish his present character: an old frail man being taken care of by his overbearing wife (convincingly played by Olympia Dukakis), from dressing him up, putting toothpaste on his toothbrush, to buttering his toast. He accompanies his wife, who drives them both to the grocery, where she gets a heart attack. He helplessly looks on. While she is temporarily hospitalized, the children worry about their father. The son (Ted Danson) is a successful corporate type, who quickly flies in to see to it that everything's okay. He is met by his brother-in-law (Kevin Spacey), and his sister (Kathy Baker). The absentee son is shocked to see how much his father has deteriorated, and so spends more time with him out of guilt. He doesn't intend to stay long as he has business to attend to, and so he makes sure that his father can be independent and take care of himself. Pretty soon, Dukakis is back and is surprised to see her husband up and about. All is well till it's his turn to suddenly get hospitalized. The doctor suspects cancer. Soon, he's in a coma, and the son does everything he can to care for his father. Somewhere in the middle of this, his own son (Ethan Hawke), comes in. He is estranged from his father but is apparently very close to his grandfather. After what seems like ages, and now in the hands of a more compassionate, competent doctor, the old man wakes up. He celebrates his new lease on life by being more carefree, lively and spontaneous. He has been diagnosed to be a bit schizophrenic, with the film's opening sequence revealing the dream life he's been living in his head to cope with his problems. His family is astonished, but humors him, except for his wife, who openly shows her displeasure at his apparent craziness. But later on, it is his new zest for life that infects everyone and brings the family together. It helps the old couple open their world to new things and new people at that stage in their life. In the end, cancer does overcome his body, but not his spirit and of those around him. I like how the movie finishes on a positive yet realistic note, without milking the situation with an embarrassing display of melodrama. It's a scary thing to watch someone you've always known as strong slowly wither before you. It must have been excruciating for the son to watch his own father not be able to do the things that he used to do, not even dress himself up. This was also painfully illustrated in one scene where the son, angry at the poor treatment his father endured from the first doctor, carries his dad out of the hospital. The father's body appeared so weak and frail in his son's arms. This role reversal a la Pieta comes as quite a shocker, as it disturbs the equilibrium an awful lot. As the eldest child, I've had the good fortune to enjoy my parents at their prime. I grew up content in the belief that I always had my strong, funny, patient father and my always organized and in-control mother to take care of anything, big or small. And then I aged in years, but still terribly spoiled and immature, while my folks seem to have silently been plateauing. While my folks have not been as terribly sick as in the movie, the threat of it happening is always there. Dad has been a wake-up call for me to reevaluate what matters most in life and to reallocate my time to doing the things that are truly of value. Everyone can relate to this film because everyone has parents, or someone they depend on or are close to. There is no big villain to hate or escape from in this film; no unrealistic and complicated plot twists, telenovela-style. Nothing, that is, except the bigger danger of apathy, the silent killer in each of our relationships. Therein lies the true conflict, and the earlier we choose to recognize it and act on it, the better our relationships can be. Now who would've known such knowledge could stem from a desire to see Ethan Hawke?

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