PopFiller: Of Wrinkles and Risk

By Pamela Canning

Something’s Gotta Give was on television the other night, I had seen bits and pieces of it before, but this time, with my glass of wine and bowl of popcorn, I was engulfed.  The story is about an aging woman feeling passion, as an adult woman, for the first time.  She began to love her body, stripping herself of stifling turtlenecks along the way, but for this character the transformation was not an easy one.

The character Erica Barry (Diane Keaton) was the star of the show followed closely by her new found love, Harry Sanborn (Jack Nicholson).  Erica, a successful writer who lived in a beautiful home on the ocean, had taken care of herself financially, but forgot to nurture her heart as well as her soul.  In shutting herself off to the wonders of real love she had taught her daughter, Marin (Amanda Peet) to do the same, leaving both of them lonely and quite frustrated.   Harry Sanborn had never seen a woman his own age naked, always surrounding himself with much younger women, somehow convincing himself that it would slow down his own aging reality.  Keaton’s courage to make this movie Botox free showed the courage of an aging Hollywood actress who is comfortable, literally, in her own skin.  She opens her heart to a passionate affair then regrets it feeling vulnerable and unguarded.  What she learns is one must come out of their comfort zone, taking a risk sometimes doesn’t work out, but sometimes it does. The movie ends with Barry and Sanborn coming together comfortably, realizing they belong together, and leaving their hardened selves behind.

Keaton, like Erica, put herself out there, wrinkles and all.  Here’s to the Hollywood that does not just cater to the toned, young, unwrinkled audience.