Highly Overrated But Still Good

everything you have heard about this movie is true.

Excellent characters with emotional depth. My wife, daughter and granddaughter all enjoyed it...and me, too! Very good movie! You won't be disappointed.

The film may be flawed, but its message is not.

This movie didn't have much to offer in the way of well, anything.Everything's kind of played for laughs and made in the semi-surreal documentary style of filming that was sort of in vogue at the time.The acting was OK by everyone except Yaphett Kotto who never has learned how to not overact. You can argue that he's supposed to be playing a maniac, yet he acts the same in every movie he's been in.I had high hopes for this movie, Larry Cohen's directorial debut, Yapphet Kotto playing a racist homicidal rapist, etc. But Kotto seems about as harmless as a parakeet and the story is just very flat. Just mediocre all the way around.

BONE (3+ outta 5 stars) Very odd film that gets better and better the more times you see it. The plot sounds like an average thriller... but the movie is really a comedy... a very black, very subversive comedy. A well-to-do middle-aged couple (Andrew Duggan, Joyce Van Patten) have their bickering interrupted by a mysterious, threatening black man (Yaphet Kotto) who seems to come out of nowhere. He ransacks the house, looking for money. After coming up dry he sends the husband to the bank to withdraw some cash... if he doesn't come back in an hour he is going to rape the wife. Well, the husband takes the opportunity to run out on his wife and have a one night stand with a crazy woman he meets outside of the bank. The wife and her captor, in the meantime, actually begin to form a bond... and soon take off after the errant husband to seek their revenge. Or do they? Excellent performances and dialogue. I was a little taken aback by the movie the first time I saw it because I wasn't sure where it was going... so you'll need to keep an open mind to fully appreciate it. Why was Yaphet Kotto never a big movie star? He OWNS this movie! (Then again, he pretty well owns EVERY movie he appears in.) Classic opening dream sequence of Andrew Duggan selling used cars filled with gruesome accident victims!

Oh man, this film is good. Beautifully acted, the entire cast seemed to understand their place in the movie perfectly. Some very strong social observations are made within as well, making Cohen's script work on multiple levels. The way everything has a surreal feeling to it, it almost feels like a dream the whole way through. And where did Yaphet Kotto come from, and where did he go in the end? Very mysterious, but it all fits into the dream, possibly the dream of the son in Vietnam? I haven't been so excited about a comedy in awhile, this film needs to be seen. Rating: 35/40

At last I have found the holy grail of modern cinema. 'Housewife' is the film many people spend half their lives looking for. The stylized approach to incidental music, flashback techniques and the coming together of elusive plot strands all go towards making a truly first class motion picture. This film stands as a beacon shining in the darkness from continent to continent, breaking every mould, chasing its own hysteria which the film makes no bones about concealing. 'Housewife' is the yardstick for a truly wonderful film.