Is it arrogent to quote your own writing? When I closed my essay on Martin Scorsese, I mentioned how many films and directors touch a nerve and are widley praised at the time but do not stand up to history. Here is such a film. In 1979, Kramer vs. Kramer seemed to be an instant classic, drawing critical raves and awards (yet another installment in my Best Picture marathon) as well as being third highest grossing film of the year. Seen now, it looks like an extramly well acted Lifetime movie, with the substance of such.
The movie probably struck such a nerve because it was one of the first major Hollywood films to deal with divorce and child custody issues at a time that contemporary society had begunn to come to terms with such issues as well. In the late '70's divorce happend to the middle class, not just the rich and bohemian artists. Sure, lots of movie characters were divorced before, but few were the everyman character that Hoffman plays here, and few still had children.
Hoffman plays Ted Kramer, a workaholic advertising executive whose wife, Joanna, suddenly and without warning leaves him to "find herself" (her words). She also leaves Ted to care for their five year old son, Billy (Justin Henry). At first Ted is flustered and awkward with Billy but later becomes an outstanding father. Everything seems relativley fine until Joanna returns, eighteen months after leaving, and demands full custody of Billy, for no good reason other than the fact that she's a bitch. A vicous court battle ensues (hence the title).
The biggest problem with this movie is that it's shamelessly manipulative. Ted is not just a good father, he's a rediculously good father. Even worse, almost everything that Joanna does has to do with the fact that screenplay needs her to provide conflict, even when she does things that are not logical (Why does she need full custody of Billy? What's wrong with a joint custody agreement?). All of the major characters in the movie underwritten, and the movie drives home it's point with the subtley of a loudspeaker.
The point is, of course, that fathers can be just as good (and sometimes better) parents than mothers. This might have been daring in the '70's but now falls under the "duh" category. On a more basic level, the movie is a "problem film" dealing with the problem of divorce. Once again, to my generation, this is a bit of an anacharnyism- divorce may be right in some occurances and wrong in others, but mostly just is. I would venture to argue that the problem is not so much with bad behavior in marriges then it is with incomptable people getting married for the wrong reasons in the first place, but subtleites like that are beyond this movie. Seeing this made me appreciate The Squid and the Whale even more, for despite it's comic quirkiness, the family dynamics are similer to what might happen to real people. In it's defense, the movie is strongly acted by two great actors (Hoffman and Streep), who do their best with underwritten roles, but that's all it really has going for it.
History's verdict on this film is not positive-particularly when the Oscars are taken into account. I doubt too many people now would argue that it's a better film than Francis Ford Coppola's Apocalyspe Now or Bob Fosse's All That Jazz, both of which it was competing against for Best Picture. I also argue that Martin Ritt's rural drama Norma Rae is also superior to Benton's work (I havn't seen the fifth nominee, Peter Yates' coming-of-age dramady Breaking Away). Maybe I am being a little too harsh in this review, as the movie was clearly effective and welcome in its time. It's just that while yesterday's audiences found it daring, I never thought it was daring enough.
Kramer vs. Kramer (1979)