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5 out of 5 people found the following comment useful :- A good movie., 16 September 1999 Author: Hermit C-2 from Marietta, GA, USA
'The Good Wife' is for those who like films that focus on an obscure little corner of the world and look at the feelings and foibles of the people therein. This time the camera is aimed at a small Australian town in 1939, where Marge Hills (Rachel Ward) feels that life is passing her by despite her work as a midwife and marriage to a loving husband. Nothing exciting ever happens to her, she thinks, and her attempts to make something happen get her into all sorts of small-town trouble.Rachel Ward is such a beauty and has such a presence that I probably would have been content to watch her putter around the kitchen for ninety minutes at this stage of her career. Anyone familiar with Bryan Brown's work will not be surprised to hear that he is excellent in the role of Sonny, the husband. Steven Vider is also very good as Sugar, Sonny's younger brother, a youth so callow that he asks his brother if it's OK to sleep with his wife. Sam Neill is the newcomer to town whose attention Marge tries so desperately to get. A lot of people would describe this as a "little" film but I got more enjoyment out of it than many of its bigger brethren.
6 out of 7 people found the following comment useful :- Nicely done film, eye-candy cinematography..., 26 May 2002 Author: Eric-1226 from Seattle, Washington
"The Good Wife" is a film that seems to have a lot of quiet seductive power.... the story itself, which I found only minimally absorbing, is also somewhat lame and perhaps a bit goofy (Marge, a married woman, played by Rachel Ward, feels bored and unfulfilled in her rural Australian setting and first sleeps with her husband's younger brother, then begins to lust after a local barman played by Sam Neill...). However, the atmospheric setting, the scenery, the cinematography, the costumes, the characters, the enchanting background music - well, just about ALL elements of the film, are so rich and vibrant that they suck you right in, and more than make up for the rather daft story line. Hence, "The Good Wife" is that sort of movie where you end up caring about the fates of the various players. You actually care about the denouement of the movie, because as the story unfolds, you really do start to care about the players as human beings, and you can't help but become interested in their individual destinies.The creators of the film did an excellent job of recreating the look and feel of the time period of the story, which is set in 1939 Australia. I especially like the attention given to minute details that help to establish time and place and also give the movie a rich and full-bodied flavor. The eye-candy cinematography is just spectacular. This is easily one of the most "beautiful" movies I've ever seen. I'm glad I taped this movie off of a cable showing on TV. I will definitely be watching this one again!!
6 out of 7 people found the following comment useful :- Good character study, 11 April 2002 Author: oftenwrong from Calif.USA
I saw this movie for the second time again after having seen it when it first came out in 1987. I enjoyed it just as much now as I did then. The characters are interesting and thought-provoking especially the main character, Marge Hills played by Rachel Ward. It's about a woman who lives in a small town in Australia ca.1939. She has a loving husband but feels that life is passing her by and that exciting things only happen to other people. Enter Sam Neill. He comes to town and things change drastically for her. I felt sorry for her character which rapidly becomes pathetic. This is a movie for people who don't need a whole lot of action and special effects. I also liked seeing Bryan Brown and Rachel Ward teamed up again. The first time was in The Thorn Birds where I believe they actually met and, sometime afterward, eventually got married.
7 out of 9 people found the following comment useful :- Highly recommend!, 6 July 2002 Author: Mumsy2 from Boston, MA
Although it has been quite some time since I have seen this film, I recall it being very intense, realistic, and well-acted. Rachel Ward in one of her best roles. Provocative subject matter, great setting/backdrop. Just a really good picture, NOT to be confused with a chick-flick. Even the husband truly enjoyed it.
6 out of 8 people found the following comment useful :- Rachel Ward is incredible, 14 December 2003 Author: RDenial from Detroit
Rachel Ward gives an incredible performance in this movie of a woman so obsessed with a man, that she slowly loses all dignity and her standing in the community. This is a powerful movie but could have been much better if the scene where she sleeps with her husbands brother in the beginning was left out. I really think the movie could be improved if that scene, which has nothing to do with the events that follow, could be edited out. That scene makes Ward's character seem to be a sleaze and only hurts the main story. If you can fast forward through that, you will see a well respected woman who loses everything in pursuit of a real jerk. Oh, how truthful this film is.
3 out of 4 people found the following comment useful :- Very Interesting Movie -- I like it more as time goes on!, 7 February 2008 Author: Tekla-too from United States
*** This comment may contain spoilers ***
At first this movie made no sense to me: why did the husband allow the wife to sleep with his brother, why did the wife do it, why did the husband put up with his obnoxious brother anyhow, why was the barman so curt with his first (and only) come-on to the wife that he seemed more like a rapist than a rogue, why did the rapist/rogue lose interest so quickly (as the wife is very beautiful), and why in the heck did the wife ever want the barman at all? None of these things made any sense to me (not to mention that to me the barman was not anything as dashing as his part gave him credit for being).Then when I watched it again -- mostly because my screen had been messed up (with way too little lighting the first time) -- I started noticing other things I too often take for granted perhaps: how loving and loyal the husband was to his brother, how loving the wife and husband were to one another, how mechanical (read very boring) the sex was between the husband and wife, how premature the ejaculation between the wife and husband's brother (the first and only time they had sex with one another, with the husband's full consent), how disloyal and disrespectful the husband's brother was to anyone and everyone, what a total jerk the barman was from front to finish. Asking myself again what was the significance that the wife's mother was a total floozy. The wife and her mother chose different paths in life, but maybe for this one episode the daughter was reflecting the mother's ways more...Then things started to occur to me: that perhaps part of the reason the wife felt like her life seemed so devoid of meaning was not only that she had no children but also that sex had already become so "ho-hum" between her and her husband. Perhaps she would never have considered a liaison with any other man the rest of her life had it not been for her husband allowing, and thus encouraging, that she basically whore for his brother that one time. Perhaps his premature ejaculation brought her to a higher degree of frustration. While on the one hand she was loyal and having mechanical sex with her husband, she loved him and he her and it was okay; but now that she had a chance to hope for something to feel a bit special in that regard, with the brother, it was a total wash. Now her husband and unleashed something, by allowing that tryst with he brother. Now her anime within sought fulfillment, and supposed it could get a passionate response from the rogue/rapist. Really she went a bit crazy, and surely the sex drive can make most men and women act crazed and foolish, especially when no holds are barred.There was a very touching scene where the wife says the barman "must love her" because otherwise how could she possibly feel the way she did? What she felt was so exciting and felt so good and any woman that beautiful knows she is beautiful. There was simply no reason for the barman not to want her; so she thought and felt. He was really such a jerk, and actually the only person in the film I feel was a bit mis-cast. For this role I would have liked to have seen a man with much more magnetism, charisma.Anyhow, as the movie goes on we find the husband reacting with trying to get her back and being incredibly loving toward her -- not at all the kind of husband we are used to seeing in so many movies and in so many scenes in real life that becomes angry and violent.Really this woman could have lost her husband so easily by her actions, and for quite a while was totally okay with losing him. That he took her back and loved her as he did was so beautiful to me. The movie ended as if we were at the end of the film in "The Wizard of Oz." She had wanted something interesting to happen, it had happened, the "bad guys" were gone now -- (both the upstart brother and the jerk barman) -- and this was her home where she was cherished.Beautiful.
3 out of 4 people found the following comment useful :- Turnaround of the usual man cheating scenario, 18 October 2006 Author: telcam from United States
In this immoral little farce the women feel free to indulge in their fantasies. When Marge is propositioned by her brother-in-law she says talk to Sonny about it. Then when Sonny tells Sugar that it's alright as long as it's okay with Marge, she feels like it doesn't matter and goes ahead. When the stranger comes to town she is smitten with him like half of the other town's women. Seems like their men don't have what it takes to satisfy them. Marge has a free-wheeling mother who does whatever she pleases, and she doesn't want her to be a servant to anyone. Her mother is rather surprised by her amorous pursuit of the new stud in town. This is quite a situation given that it's in 1939, but this is Australia, known for the unexpected. When Marge is pining away for this stranger Sonny get defensive, and feels betrayed. But they are true soul mates and neither them have scruples. At the end Sonny has sent Sugar packing, and brought his Marge back home.
4 out of 6 people found the following comment useful :- Highly recommend!, 6 July 2002 Author: Mumsy2 from Boston, MA
2 out of 3 people found the following comment useful :- truth of the human being, 15 April 2002 Author: Zilius
I saw the second half of this movie on cable starting from the point where Sam Neil came into town. Then the next day i caught the second half again. The story and the truth it brought to me was captivating. It brought many things to my mind. besides that it reminded me of many things it was all very atractivly shot with beutifull powerfull actors/actresses.i noticed there is only one comment in 3 years about this film and feeling so strongly about it i worte this. I have noticed many have though nothing of this film. though it fake or a physcolical atempt at "showing us something" "being something" but i belive these peoples life expereance has not agreed with the content and for that reason they do not like it. It has seemed very real to me. Although the style of acting in many ways is more like stage acting and carried more by the writers ideas then by the "relisim" of the actors themselvs. But what true ideas the writer has shown us!
3 out of 6 people found the following comment useful :- Could art possibly imitate life?, 9 July 2006 Author: billy3280 from United States
What a heart-rendering plot! Throughout the movie, I kept wondering if there was the faintest chance that any close-knit community under the stars harbored secrets similar to the plot...Both brothers scruples, Marge's sexual appetite and the manner in which the town takes everything in step...It is sickeningly-refreshing to see this small town's women enjoy their sexuality as much as they do...To think all it takes is one male catalyst (Sam Neill's character, Neville) to turn women loose! Every guy's fantasy role...How am I to imagine the emotional toll this movie shoot took both on Rachel Ward and Bryan Brown (married to each other)?...Wow!
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