Rating: 3/5
Ruth Patchett does everything to keep the spark in her marriage alive. As her husband, Bob, moves up in his accounting career, he is at home less with her and their two children.
Mary Fisher is a successful romance novelist living in a pink mansion on Long Island. She falls for her new accountant, Bob Patchett, and begins a torrid affair.
Ruth has a devastating evening with Bob and his parents. Afterward, Bob lists his assets and his one liability: Ruth.
Ruth takes the list — the house, the family, the career, and his freedom — and plots to ruin all of them.
The movie explores internalized misogyny, looking at the luxuries afforded to white men.
Unfortunately, the movie also takes an “us-verses-them stance” on conventionally attractive women and the women outside that narrow band.
Still, the movie has a message of autonomy and empowerment. Though, it is told through a dark and stark sense of humor.
Meryl Streep plays self-absorbed to perfection. Ed Begley Jr. is as scummy as I’ve ever seen him. The script doesn’t ask Roseanne Barr to do too much. She nails the scorned woman, ascending through the flames of her carnage.
I watched it with my sister and youngest niece. My niece kept saying, “What the fuck?” when the humor got too dark for her. I laughed the hardest at that.