The Wife: Film Review

The Wife: Film Review

Cast: Glenn Close, Jonathan Pryce, Max Iron, Christian Slater
Director: Bjorn Runge

Slow-burning and blessed with two powerhouse leads, the adaptation of Meg Wolitzer's 2003 novel, The Wife is definitely a film for those older in years looking to reflect.

Close and Pryce are husband and wife Joan and Joe Castleman, whose lives are irrevocably changed when Joe gets a call offering him a Nobel peace prize, to be awarded in Stockholm for his writing.

As they head off to the ceremony for the literary award, Joe's agog at what's ahead and Joan is the supportive long-suffering wife who sits in the background, happy to keep him on schedule and out of the limelight.

But as the ceremony nears, tensions rear between the two as their history is thrown into the spotlight.

The Wife is a perfectly fine piece of drama, that bogs itself down with its flashbacks and exposition.

The desire to explore this blowhard husband and the stoic wife stutters as it jump between the past and now, with the best part of the work coming in the present as the powderkeg nears explosion.

It helps that Close and Pryce spar well, and equally gel; their portrayal of a long marriage and of decisions made in the past help anchor the piece as it chops and changes. If Close is strong in her delivery, stoic and still in her building rage and regret, Pryce is equally dismissive and oblivious to what's around him.

Close is very much the patient glue which holds the drama together, a nuanced turn that anchors proceedings as the reflections play out. The wry delivery of some of the lines also provide plenty of barbs as well, with the screenplay built very much on the three-act play approach.

Ultimately, The Wife soars when it deals its hand of the present day fallout of the past. And a clever examination of some of the final wording proves delicious in many ways as well.

But The Wife flounders in its execution of the past, and confuses the reasoning adopted by some of the lead characters; it remains enigmatic and like a stageplay in its execution - though overall, that's no bad thing.