Just perfect...

It’s an especially fun movie from a director and cast who are clearly having a good time allowing themselves to let loose.

The film creates a perfect balance between action and depth of basic needs, in the midst of an infertile atmosphere.

Blistering performances.

I saw this movie when I was a teenager. From what I remember of it, it was a waste of good talent. Walter Matthau did his best acting and Jack Lemmon did his best directing. However, somehow the script just didn't do justice for either one of these two celebrities. I've seen Deborah Winters in other movies and back then it seemed as though she gravitated towards controversial roles such as a 16-year old drug addict or pregnant teenager. I absolutely hate that song "Life Is What You Make It," because they played it throughout this entire movie over and over again; and seeing the pregnant teenage Deborah Winters and hearing Walter Matthau's New York accent as this unusually compassionate older man somehow reminded me constantly of how much I absolutely hate deadbeat teen fathers. I always got the feeling throughout the film that I just wanted a scene in which the teen father of this girl's baby got the tar knocked out of him for being such a jerk. I vaguely recall one scene in which he actually spoke with Deborah Winters after he had gotten her pregnant, but he was more annoying than anything. The kind of teen father that would create a precedent in our court system to make justifiable patricide perfectly legal for all youngsters who have the indignity of having someone like him for a biological father. By the way, I disagree with the title of that stupid song, "Life Is What You Make It." I can't believe that song even won an award. It's crass and callous in its lyrics, because some people are born more privileged than others in the real world and the lyrics of that song just don't own up to that same reality of life. If you have nothing better to do with your time, you may want to give this movie a peek. However, if you have limited time like me, it's probably not worth watching.

I had never seen Kotch, but had always wanted to because of the presence of Walter Matthau and because of Jack Lemmon as director. It finally showed up on TCM the other night and, after years of waiting, I sadly have to agree with the lone previous viewer who found it wretched. I hate to be, once again, the turd in the punchbowl of hosannas here, but there are no characters in this movie, only cardboard cutouts. Matthau (who I love) is simply not credible here as a man who needs to be put away; his off-the-wall performance never makes us believe he is anywhere close to senile. The opening scene, with its aforementioned treacly 70's score, is predictive of the dreck to come. The movie is never played for human drama but only for cheap laughs, and those are few and far between. In the end I did what I rarely do, i.e. said to myself "why I am torturing myself," shut it off, and put on a good Laurel and Hardy movie.

When this movie first came out I was in college and must have taken 4 or 5 different dates to see it. This movie was a mini cult phenomenon on campus, at least where I was, so I have always been surprised that it didn't get more publicity and acclaim. I saw it so many times because I felt it was a very worthwhile and meaningful film as a view into aging, the way we take care of elderly people, especially when it might be inconvenient for us. It was a good look into the feelings and hang-ups of people interacting among themselves: a retired man feeling increasingliy irrelevant in the environment he is compelled to live in, his spineless and uncomprehending son who doesn't offer much support at all, and his post-natal depressive daughter-in-law who can't understand why she has to put up with this codger who complicates her alreay-more-complicated life. The movie also has a lot to say about the power of the human spirit to cope with change and make the best of things that aren't always going the way we always want them to.I would like to see it again after 30+ years, but I can't find it at the usual rental stores. Having thought about it, though, I will continue to seek.

I watch this movie all the time I love it they don't make em' like this anymore. I like this movie mostly cause the music it's very comforting you can watch when your sad when your happy when your angry mostly it calms you down. I saw it first when I was 13 and I still watch not on a daily basis I dont even own it yet YET I'm going to bye it soon cause one of the only feel good movies I've ever seen. Thank you JACK LEMMON.