Save your money for something good and enjoyable

A bit overrated, but still an amazing film

Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

Excellent and certainly provocative... If nothing else, the film is a real conversation starter.

Dreadful. Any film that contains a sequence (usually 'poignant') of a character (typically a middle-aged man) watching home movies of happier days is a picture that shamelessly courts clichés. "Full Moon in Bright Water" begins with such a scene--before we even know who the characters are or what the circumstance is (I was more curious who was shooting the home movies while Gene Hackman and his wife frolic on the lake). Widower Hackman, grieving his wife's not-recent death by drowning, runs a tired old lakefront bar on the Texas coast; the county commissioner is trying to frighten him into selling the property for the prime real estate value (Hackman doesn't know he's sitting on a goldmine--the script is that stupid). Director Peter Masterson keeps the nitwit story rolling along, but somewhere late in the second reel I felt he and the cast had nothing more to offer. Elias Koteas as a not-too-bright bar-employee nearly shows up the heavyweight stars (Hackman, Teri Garr and Burgess Meredith), but his role is made impossible by a ridiculous turn of events. The action is kept very busy, yet the characters never take shape and some of the dialogue is really ugly. Garr made a lot of bad film choices after her Oscar-nominated turn in "Tootsie", but what drew Hackman to such a thin, innocuous project? *1/2 from ****

Full Moon In Blue Water is not a film that gets mentioned much in the filmography of Gene Hackman (nor Teri Garr and Burgess Meredith for that matter). This forgotten and forgettable drama is very much a character piece, the kind of slow-burning story that actors love to be involved in but audiences more often than not find tedious. In this one, all the main actors seem to be very much "into" their roles but the viewer doesn't really get the chance to feel quite so absorbed and involved in the story or the characters.Ex-merchant marine Floyd (Gene Hackman) owns a restaurant in coastal Texas called the Blue Water Grill. About a year before the story begins, Floyd's wife Dorothy (Becky Ann Baker) goes missing out in the bay and is presumed dead. But without a corpse to give him the sense of closure he so desperately craves Floyd spends his days pining for her, clinging to old home movies and photographs in the forlorn hope that she may return. As the weeks drift by, his life and his business begin to collapse around him but he is so wrapped up in depression and fading memories that he barely notices. Worse still is the way that Floyd distances himself from three people in his life who genuinely need him. First there's simple-minded odd-job man Jimmy (Elias Koteas) who does occasional repair work around the restaurant. Then there's the senile old father-in-law The General (Burgess Meredith), a crusty invalid who needs constant supervision and company. Thirdly, there's local gal Louise (Teri Garr) who would willingly be Floyd's new love if she could just get him to let go of the unhealthy obsession he has with his missing wife. Louise also knows that a local property developer is about to make a ridiculously cheap bid for Floyd's restaurant, and that in his state of melancholy he might just give away everything for which he has worked for a fraction of its value.Meredith gives the most memorable performance in the film, etching a funny but believable portrayal as the demented old-timer. Hackman is solid too, although crucially his character too often acts in a manner that lacks credibility. Earlier reviewers have noted that there is something false about the way he allows things to fall apart. Could he really be so besotted with the memory of a lost wife that he would let a business they set up together go to ruin? With her father still alive and dependant upon him for care and companionship, would he really act so distant? And with a beautiful woman like Garr literally offering herself on a plate, wouldn't he at the very least give this new relationship a go? For me, these are the flaws in character development that make Full Moon In Blue Water less engrossing than it should be. It's great to see films that are prepared to do away with action and special effects and high melodrama, but when a film is as character-driven as this one it needs characters that are credible and identifiable. Full Moon In Blue Water comes unstuck because on the one hand we can all relate to Floyd's predicament but on the other it's almost impossible to relate to his self-indulgent reaction to it. A watchable movie, then, but not really as fulfilling as it might have been.

Maybe I'm just a sucker for white sands and blue water, even more of a sucker for sweet stories, but I loved this movie. Yes, I could get critical, but then I could be critical about just about every movie I've ever seen. Bottom line is, I loved this movie, I like Terri Garr, I like Gene Hackman, and I found nothing bad about this movie. I like romantic movies, and this was certainly that. Gene made a believable everyman buried in sadness about the loss of his wife, while Terri was her usual professional self, playing a woman in love with him but unable to break through his shell. Burgess Meridith, during his life, made a career out of playing crusty characters, and this one was no exception. I only tried this film an someone else's recommendation, and it turned out to be a good one.

Lately I've been on a Gene Hackman 1980's kick. Hoosiers, many folks think is the best portrayal of a sports coach, maybe the best sports film ever made. Twice in a Lifetime is a middle-aged love story of betrayal in a blue-collar family and it ranks up there as the best of Hackman's work. Then there is a less successful film, Full Moon in Blue Water.No one in the movies in the last thirty years portrays the middle-age everyman, the tough, and hard working, Joe like Hackman. He's certainly not a romantic idol, but he is manly enough to woe Ann Margaret in Once in a Lifetime and Teri Garr in Water. In addition, Garr is very good as a faded honky-tonk town girl with widower, Hackman in her sights. The trouble, Hack is still in love with his missing spouse. He spends most of his days watching old home movies of the lost wife while his saloon business goes to pieces. Also, he must deal with a stroke victim, the father-in-law, Burgesss Meredith, the quintessential old coot.Somehow the viewer will not believe that a capable character like Hack would let a business go to sleazy Real Estate snakes without a bar brawl. The idea that Hack would moon about the ex for a year while busty Garr is all over him; well, it doesn't add up.