The War of the Roses

Plot synopsis:
Lawyer Gavin d'Amato is in his office discussing a divorce case with a client. Noticing the man's determination to divorce his wife, Gavin decides to tell him the story of one of his clients, a personal friend of his.
Oliver Rose, a student at Harvard Law School, meets Barbara at an auction, where they bid on the same antique. Oliver chats Barbara up and they become friends. When Barbara misses her ferry home, the two end up spending the night together. Eventually the two marry and have two children. Over the years, the Roses grow richer, and Barbara finds an old mansion whose owner has recently died, and purchases it. However, cracks seem to be forming in the family, such as the children being overweight due to Barbara spoiling them with treats. As Oliver becomes a successful partner in his law firm, Barbara, who was a doting and loving wife early in the marriage, appears to grow restless in her life with Oliver, and begins to dislike him immensely.
Oliver, for his part, cannot understand what he has done to earn Barbara's contempt, despite his controlling, self-centered, and generally dismissive behavior toward her. When Oliver believes he is suffering a heart attack, the day after an argument, Barbara does not show any remorse or concern for his well-being, and ultimately admits that she no longer loves him and wants a divorce. Oliver accepts, but tension arises between the two when it becomes clear that Barbara wants the house and everything in it, even using Oliver's final love note to her (which he had written in the hospital) as leverage against him in their legal battle. Barbara initially throws Oliver out of the house, but he moves back in after discovering a loophole that allows him to stay for the time being. As a result, Barbara immediately begins plotting to remove Oliver herself, even trying to seduce Oliver's lawyer Gavin into siding with her instead.
In an effort to compromise, Oliver offers his wife a considerable sum of cash in exchange for the house, but Barbara still refuses to settle. Realizing that his client is in a no-win situation, Gavin advises Oliver to leave Barbara and start a new life for himself. In return, Oliver fires Gavin and takes matters into his own hands.
At this point, Oliver and Barbara begin spiting and humiliating each other in every way possible, even in front of friends and potential business clients. Both begin destroying the house furnishings; the stove, furniture, Staffordshire ornaments, and plateware. In addition, Oliver accidentally runs over Barbara's cat in the driveway. When Barbara finds out, she retaliates by trapping Oliver inside his private sauna, where he nearly succumbs to heatstroke and dehydration.
While the kids are away at college, Oliver eventually calms down and attempts to make peace with Barbara over an elegant dinner, but reaches his breaking point when Barbara serves him a paté which she implies was made from his dog. Oliver attacks Barbara, who flees into the attic. Oliver boards up the house to prevent Barbara from escaping, while Barbara loosens the chandelier to drop on Oliver to kill him. When their housekeeper Susan pays them an unexpected visit during the night, she senses something is terribly wrong and discreetly contacts Gavin for help. By the time Gavin arrives, Oliver and Barbara's quarrel has culminated in the two hanging dangerously from the insecure chandelier. During this time, Oliver admits to Barbara that despite their hardships, he always loved her, but Barbara does not respond. Before Gavin can come inside with a ladder, the chandelier's support cable snaps and sends them crashing violently to the floor. In his final breaths, Oliver reaches out to touch Barbara's shoulder, but Barbara uses her last ounce of strength to knock his hand away, firmly asserting her feelings for him even in death.
Finishing his story, Gavin presents his client with two options: either proceed with the divorce and face a horrific bloodbath in court, or go home to his wife to settle their differences properly. The client chooses the latter, and Gavin, satisfied, packs up his office to go home to his own family.

Tags: comedy, satire, murder

Review:
This movie has the directorial perfection of a good Alfred Hitchcock thriller, but it's not either a thriller or a comedy; it's a unique mix of elements from several genres, that does contain some laughs and sardonic humor, but also has serious undertones, mostly thanks to Michael Douglas' three-dimensional character and surprisingly sensitive performance.
Sometimes his satire just falls short ("Death to Smoochy," for example); however, "War of the Roses" is his strongest directorial effort to date.It's got everything - a clever script, great interaction between its two stars, exciting thrills, funny gags (without ever resorting to unnecessary crudity), and to top it all off, the direction is very effective - DeVito is heavily influenced by Hitchcock and that is very clear in the final sequence, which is reminiscent of "Vertigo" and "Rear Window." Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner play the Rose couple - two once-happily-married people who are now, after many years together, bitter and at the end of their frustration.
Deciding upon a divorce, they begin to split apart; however, negotiations regarding belongings begin to go awry as Oliver Rose (Douglas) demands more from his wife, claiming it's his money that purchased their enormous house and all objects inside.DeVito turns in a performance as the narrator, and Oliver's lawyer, who tells us at the start we are about to watch a sad tale about divorce.
It's believable because the characters are given such room to grow and their conflict blossoms throughout the picture.I'd classify "War of the Roses" as one of the funniest, cleverest and most underrated black comedies of the 1980s - it's one of my personal favorite movies and never fails to crack me up.
He of course reserved the best role in the film for himself  he is the wise man who tells the parable and who emerges victorious in the end.The War of the Roses with its merciless cruelness remains one of my favourite comedies of all time..
Once the ugliness starts, there's no stopping it, and the film rapidly becomes a very black comedy.Turner and Douglas receive able support from a very funny Danny Devito, who also directed, and the wonderful Marianne Sagebrecht, who provides a gentle presence amidst the chaos..
Danny Devito manages to accomplish this while simultaneously putting together a very entertaining and funny black comedy.Kathleen Turner does a tremendous job depicting a frustrated homemaker who has gradually and irreversibly grown to loathe her husband, played by Michael Douglas.
Douglas in turn cleverly plays the oafish and smug breadwinner desperately seeking to preserve the marriage, though never quite admitting it to the audience or himself.Overall, the War of the Roses remains a classic movie generally under-appreciated..
From the wickedly clever title to the smashing finale, WAR OF THE ROSES is probably the best dark comedy ever committed to film, Tim Burton and other works by Danny DeVito notwithstanding.
In "Throw Momma from the Train", De Vito had already established his capability to mix between dark humor and Oedipian issues, in "The War of the Roses", the comedic aspect on which relies the greatness of the film, fails to hide its intelligent sociological commentary on marriage, and whatever can build it or make the most solidly built one literally collapse."The War of the Roses": the title is ironically very poetic as if it deliberately conveyed the ambiguity between love, flame and passion (roses) and probably the most violent, absurd yet representative constituent of humanity: the exercise of war.
Indeed, and it's one of the strengths of the script, the hatred between Oliver (Michael Douglas) and Barbara Rose (Kathleen Turner) is never detached from the passion that made the love story possible, and this is essential to understand why the level of violence graduated in such a spectacular and disturbing way.
The point is not to admit that Oliver loved Barbara and she was the one who started hating him, or that he was a selfish jerk and she was a collateral damage of his ambition, I think what the film achieves to accomplish is to make us root for the opposite gender, or at least try to understand what went wrong from the other side.
I watched the film with my girlfriend expecting her to root for Barbara while she was on Oliver's side, as a reaction, I tried to understand Barbara and the diagnosis I came with is that she sacrificed an exhilarating feeling of freedom to build a family, and while she never doubted her husband's true love, she felt like he was loving his idea of the couple, more than the couple itself.
Douglas is brilliant as a tender but laughably self-centered jerk while Turner pushes a certain level of sexy deliberate evilness as the counterpart of twenty years of eternal docility.The performances, the set-up, efficiently works to create an unforgettable third act, when the war can start, and if the movie doesn't avoid some predictable or over-the-top situations, it remains faithful to its own premise by showing how far a couple can go during a divorce.
And the film is so dark and perverse, than it doesn't leave us with much optimism about the fate of Oliver and Barbara Rose.Love and hate are fruits from the same tree  and I guess one can't intensely hate a person if he hasn't experienced a totally opposite feeling.
I remember seeing this film in the theater.Always have enjoyed it.How dirty each character will play to get that house.True, I do not like the film as much today as I did when first released.Trying to point my finger as to why.The end of Kathleen's time in the 1980's of being a popular actress.
Danny DeVito took the Black Comedy to its most intense level of blackness with the 1989 comedy THE WAR OF THE ROSES, which reunited ROMANCING THE STONE stars Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner, as the Roses, an affluent California couple who have a gorgeous home and family, tons of money and expensive things, and anything else a family could ask for but somewhere along the way, Oliver and Barbara Rose become disenchanted with each other and decide to divorce, but neither refuses to give up the house, which ignites a war between these two married combatants which has tragic circumstances.
Though it's not an easy watch, THE WAR OF THE ROSES is worth seeing for its jaundiced view of marriage and divorce as seen through the demented eyes of Danny De Vito..
This noted - I should state that the magnitude of meanness on display here isn't justifiable, though the degree Kathleen Turner's character (Barbara) is taken for granted early on in the movie is shown in fine detail, providing something of a context for the rampaging anger she surrenders to during the film's latter half.
When a young intelligent couple (Two-Time Oscar Winner:Michael Douglas & Kathleen Turner), who did feel in love at first sight, then they got married and then they have two children.
Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner star as Oliver and Barbara Rose.
The movie relates a story being told by attorney Gavin D'Amato (Danny DeVito) to a client in an effort to convince the client not to get a divorce.Oliver Rose had been a law partner of D'Amato's, whose long hours and commitment to his career above all else led to a breakdown in the Rose's once loving marriage.
Danny DeVito's "War of the Roses" is a sharp and wickedly funny satire that looks deeply into married life and oh, yes that dreadful word - "divorce" is included, too.Michael Douglas ("Traffic", "Wonder Boys"), Kathleen Turner ("The Virgin Suicides"), and director DeVito himself star here in the tale where the peaceful lives of a married couple, Oliver and Barbara Rose (Douglas and Turner) has begun to get nasty and downright brutal.
Unforturnately, they "both" get the house and try to avoid coming into contact (verbal or physical) with each other, which makes the situation worse.DeVito, who is the film's onscreen narrator and plays Gavin, a close friend of Oliver's, tries to be careful here in how to handle the ongoing spat that Rose gets into.
I will not summarize this brilliant Danny DeVito Film except to say that it was a funny, savage, and often sinister look at one dissolving marriage and the insanity of two people holding on to the wrong things for the wrong reasons.Douglas and Turner start out so perfectly.
Boy meets girl and they get married, then, very slowly over the years tensions mount for Barbara (Kathleen Turner) until one evening she announces to Oliver, "every time I look at you I feel I could smash your face in." Oliver, played by Michael Douglas, has no idea this is coming and he looks so stunned you have to feel for him.
The end is unusual and not what we expect.Michael Douglas, Kathleen Turner, and Danny Devito, are Superb in acting performance.
I was rather surprised when I exited the theater that The War of the Roses should be bundled into a Christmas release schedule when the reality was that the film was rather ruthless and relentless in its depiction of a marriage going sour and turning into two-way bloodbath of a divorce.Having done Romancing the Stone and Jewel of the Nile together most audiences saw Douglas, Turner and DeVito on the poster and possibly subconsciously related it back to that level of comedy.
It's not long before Barbara and Oliver start sinking to new levels of depravity against one another in pursuit of the valuables that defined them during their marriage as the battle lines are drawn.The War of the Roses constantly borders on veering off the edge of comedy and into full out horror.
She is absolutely outstanding in the role.If I do have a slight complaint about the film, it's that it tends to want to puts its leads into " good guy" , "bad guy" camps and somehow DeVito misogynistacly places his female character, Barbara Rose, firmly in the "bad guy" camp.
Kathleen Turner and Michael Douglas are perfect as the uber-successful couple  Oliver and Barbara Rose  at the pinnacle of Eighties success.
Women and men can both find something to appreciate in this film,and unless you are going through a tough divorce(in particular there is a scene where the One Being Left asks the Leaver Why they are leaving and the Leaver tells them in painful detail, funny for me, might not be if I was ever left!), this movie never fails to make me laugh..
Starting as a nice comic romantic story and finishing as really dark comedy, it shows great on-screen chemistry between Kathleen Turner and Michael Douglas once again.
Clearly, Barbara had a good reason for wanting a divorce: she and Oliver both lived for and loved after pretty things and Oliver's manners were less pretty than she would have liked.All the same, Oliver and Barbara Rose are also victims of their time and place.
A bit more of old-style Hollywood class and reserve in manner would have augmented the pretension of the Roses and perhaps made the collapse of Oliver's desirability just a bit more believable, if not "sympathetic." It is a "fun" movie but falls short of "great." Overall I recommend it if you've got time on your hands.10 Aug. 2009 update: This movie has become the story of my life (or rather the lives of some people I know...) and therefore I have upped my vote..
THE WAR OF THE ROSES stars Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner as a Yuppie couple named Oliver and Barbara Rose.
A big part of their problem is that both of them are very stubborn and refuse to sell the house.When I first watched THE WAR OF THE ROSES, I basically looked at it from the viewpoint that things fell apart when Barbara announced that she wanted a divorce.
He and Barbara Share good times but they constantly have to better themselves which has a strain on their marriage and before we know it a battle like no other in the history books is about to start between husband and wife bringing this tale to be one of the most original dark comedies to come out of Hollywood for a long time.Michael Douglas is hilarious as Oliver and is a comic genius in parts just by the expression's he pulls on his face.
The chemistry is more believable as ever between Douglas and Turner and Devito's direction adds the spice to make this a great film about the hidden depths of marriage..
It's not just funny; it's also very real and poignant, especially considering the fact that most of us know someone who's had a really tough divorce and it's easy to see how things could go just as bad as they do in War of the Roses.And, unlike most of these kinds of movies and apart from my expectations, we actually end up caring about the characters, despite their overabundance of flaws.
They got good actors to play these roles, and they play them so well that we almost don't notice that it could have been much worse in the hands of anyone else.The whole story is told by Danny DeVito, who plays a divorce attorney who is telling it as a warning to a prospective client who never says a word during the entire film.
This is a black comedy about a couple, from the moment they meet, through the little stuff that make them start hate each other and up to a complete war that grows worse and worse.This movie is much darker than I remembered, but it's still very funny - and while it obviously fabricates and exaggerates certain situations, it actually shows how awful a divorce process can be, how two people who loved each other come to hate each other and how the process makes them hurt each other as much as possible.
Though it may not be up to everyones taste, due to the fact that this is a black comedy, it works well thanks to great performances by Douglas and Turner as the eternally bickering couple.Provides a great view into the world of marriage and divorce that young people should be made to watch before taking their vows, if only to show how NOT to treat your spouse.Great anti-Hollywood ending..
Played convincingly by one of my favorite acting couples, Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner, this movie takes you thru the heat of each moment of love and forgotten lack of commitment to understanding the feelings of each other and then developing hatred.
The War of the Roses is about certain stage on the lives of Oliver and Barbara Rose (Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner).
He is narrating the story too.Through the movie you see a lot of crazy things, some laughs, in general a pretty good plot.Seems like DeVito can direct.
This is a dark comedy starring Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner as a couple whose relationship takes an ugly turn when she wants a divorce.
Neither seems willing to give way on this point, and they begin to wage an ever-deepening war against one another, seeking to destroy first each other's most cherished possessions and then each other's reputations.The film stars Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner who had earlier acted together in "Romancing the Stone" and its sequel, "The Jewel of the Nile".
At the same time she is sexy enough to make us understand why, for all her spiteful antics, her husband still, in an odd way, is still in love with her- and nobody could do deranged but sexy like Turner as she was to prove in another, later black comedy, "Serial Mom" in which she plays another suburban housewife turned avenging fury.
Quite unique black comedy classic, about REVENGE, wonderfully directed by Danny DeVito, who is starring in it as well, playing a divorce attorney who is without any succes trying to peacefully divorce Michael Douglas from Kathleen Turner, but the two former lovebirds are filled with so much jealousy and contempt for each other that they both rather ruin each others lifes then ever agree to a sensible divorce...Never seen such an incredibly funny movie about the lowest and ugliest acts of treason with which divorcing couples tend to attack each other.
So I couldn't miss a chance to view again this classic , commercial free.The War of the Roses (1989) is also the sunset of the great paring of Kathleen Turner and Michael Douglas who together made some of the more memorable movies of the 1980's.This is the life and times of Oliver and Barbara Rose.
Its also an hilarious and merciless black comedy that spits and claws to the bitter end without ever holding back.The couple in this film are Oliver and Barbara Rose (Michael Douglas & Kathleen Turner).
The shock of the movie is not that the Rose's rosy marriage fails, or even that the couple are willing to kill to keep their possessions, but ultimately that their marriage was always itself all about acquisition.The film then ends with a dying Douglas putting his hand on a dying Turner.
(Kind of quoting Danny DeVito at the end of the film).Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner were superb in the transformation of the young lovers that turn into everything they never thought they could become.
So much has been written about the psychology and morality of Oliver and Barbara Rose (Michael Douglas, Kathleen Turner).
He plays the divorce lawyer who is humurously cautioning his new client about what he is about to embark upon by telling him the story of the Roses, divorcees played by Kathleen Turner ("Barbara") and Michael Douglas ("Oliver").The Roses seem to have a pretty miserable marriage.
This takes place in Washington, D.C. where we meet attorney, Gavin D'Amato (DeVito) who tells the story of ill-fated, married couple, Oliver (Douglas) and Barbara (Turner) Rose to a new client (Castellaneta).
"The War of the Roses" is a very fitting title for this movie since it tells about the unbelievable quarrel between Oliver and Barbara Rose (played by outstanding actors like Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner).