bookends, part II

Nancy Meyer's Something's Gotta Give has formula written all over it, and we get through that part it fairly quickly.

Jack Nicholson is a lecherous old man who knows how to make pretty young women happy. These are the only kind he dates. Diane Keaton is the mom of his latest date, a bright playwright who recently ended a 25 year marriage.

Daughter brings date Nicholson to the family's Hamptons beach house. Mom pops in with her feminist scholar sister (a part wasted on the lovely Frances McDormand). Old leech has a heart attack and becomes the guest who came for dinner. Mom is left nursing the leech alone at the beach house. Old leech accidentally sees mom naked. They each repulse the other. Obviously they are attracted to the other.

Meyers turns the table on the older male, younger woman relationship, bringing in Keanu Reeves as a young doctor attracted to Keaton.

Unlike Lost..., this movie embraces love and relationship. It is good to gamble, to hurt, to find the one. The story whips through the young guy relationship, onto the ex-husband, and the daughter. Finally, the movie returns to the formula with its happy ending, but before it gets there we get lots of time with Keaton and Nicholson, and that is a good thing.