Some people get excited by jewelry, some by clothing....me, I get excited when a favorite film of mine from my childhood finally gets released on DVD. 8 years ago, I had 6 videotapes left after making the change from VHS to DVD and I went to Amazon to see if any of these 6 films had a DVD release date yet. All but 2 had DVD Release Dates, but the two that remained had a box that you could check next to a statement that said "Please inform me when this movie is released on DVD". The two movies were IT'S MY TURN and CHAPTER TWO. A few weeks ago, I got an email from Amazon that said these movies were being released on DVD on April 3. Now to illustrate my reaction I must put in a situation that some of you can relate to....imagine showing up at Dillards realizing there was a huge sale that you didn't know about, or winning tickets to a World Series game, or having someone in a restaurant pick up your check as a surprise....that's on a par with the happiness I felt knowing these two movies were finally getting a DVD Release. Troy hadn't seen either one of them so we earmarked Friday and Saturday night of Easter Weekend to watch them. Tonight was IT'S MY TURN starring Jill Clayburgh and Michael Douglas. This movie was released in 1980. It was R and yes, my mother took me to see it. She was always dragging me along to see movies that she wanted to see. I'm not complaining. It's where I developed my great love for the movies. So I was 10 years old when she took me to Jamestown Mall Cine to see IT'S MY TURN at a matinee. I knew the Diana Ross song so I was happy as long as I got to hear the song. I don't remember really loving the movie since I was too young to know what was going on. But I was a good kid to take to the movies. I sat there quietly and enjoyed even what I didn't understand. A few years later, my mother rented the VHS of the movie so she could watch it again. I was a bit older and could finally appreciate the film. Then watching it again in my early twenties, it quickly became a film that I greatly enjoyed and wanted to own. Jill Clayburgh has always been one of my favorite actresses. She is such an actress of THAT era....the 70's. AN UNMARRIED WOMAN, SILVER STREAK, STARTING OVER, I'M DANCING AS FAST AS I CAN....come on, she's terrific. In IT'S MY TURN she plays Katherine, a brilliant Mathematics professor in Chicago who lives with a kind divorced father named Homer, played by Charles Grodin. One weekend, Katherine flies to New York to attend the wedding of her father and also interview for a position at NYU. At the pre-wedding dinner, she meets her new stepbrother, Ben, played by Michael Douglas. Ben is a retired baseball player due to a shoulder injury. Katherine and Ben instantly have a connection and spend the weekend flirting with danger. Ben is married but the wife is back in Ohio, Katherine has Homer back in Chicago. In one weekend, Katherine sees passion for the first time in her life. Passion from her father to his new wife, passion from her brother to his wife, and lust that could quickly become passion in the arms of this young ballplayer. It makes Katherine question everything she has known and accepted up to that point, which leads to a beautifully written scene between Clayburgh and Grodin that brings the film to a beautiful and realistic finish. Jill Clayburgh is beautiful in this film and plays it like a dream. This is one of the few films she lead that didn't garner her an Oscar nomination. The film is a little too lightweight for the Oscars. But her performance is mesmerizing and her Katherine brought in the "80's" woman. Michael Douglas has quite frankly never been sexier than he is as Ben. He is totally believable as a disheartened athlete wondering what the rest of his existence is going to bring. Clayburgh and Douglas define chemistry in this, their only film together. Jill Clayburgh passed away 2 years ago after a long battle with leukemia. I was saddened by her death. She is a symbol of my childhood since my mother loved her so much. I don't remember any women back in the late 70's who didn't love Jill Clayburgh. She was a symbol of what a woman could and should be. Her characters were always strong and complex and her portrayals were always spot-on. When the end credits rolled tonight and Diana Ross's anthem started playing, Troy said "I can't believe I've never seen that. It's wonderful." Tomorrow night, I look forward to showing him the wonderful CHAPTER TWO written by Neil Simon and starring James Caan, Marsha Mason, Valerie Harper, and Joseph Bologna.
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