Hanging Up (2000)

User Rating:

4.3/10   

Director:

Diane Keaton

Writers (WGA):

Delia Ephron (book)
Delia Ephron (screenplay) ...

Release Date:

18 February 2000 (USA)

Genre:

Comedy | Drama

Tagline:

Every family has a few hang-ups.

Plot:

A trio of sisters bond over their ambivalence toward the approaching death of their curmudgeonly father, to whom none of them was particularly close. |

Plot Keywords:

Hospital | Old Age | Actress | Family Relationships | Coma

Awards:

1 win

Cast

Meg Ryan	...	Eve Mozell Marks
Diane Keaton	...	Georgia Mozell
Lisa Kudrow	...	Maddy Mozell
Walter Matthau	...	Lou Mozell
Adam Arkin	...	Joe Marks
Shaun Duke	...	Dr. Omar Kunundar (as Duke Moosekian)
Ann Bortolotti	...	Ogmed Kunundar
Cloris Leachman	...	Pat Mozell
Maree Cheatham	...	Angie
Myndy Crist	...	Dr. Kelly
Libby Hudson	...	Libby
Jesse James	...	Jesse Marks
Edie McClurg	...	Esther
Tracee Ellis Ross	...	Kim
Celia Weston	...	Madge Turner

Also Known As:

Aufgelegt! (Germany)

MPAA:

Rated PG-13 for language and some sex-related material.

Runtime:

94 min

Country:

USA | Germany

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Sound Mix:

DTS | Dolby Digital | SDDS

Certification:

Iceland:L | Malaysia:U | USA:PG-13 (certificate #36460) | South Korea:12 | Argentina:13 | Chile:14 | Finland:S | France:U | Germany:6 | Hong Kong:IIA | Hungary:14 | New Zealand:M | Peru:14 | Singapore:PG | Sweden:Btl | Switzerland:7 (canton of Geneva) | Switzerland:7 (canton of Vaud) | UK:15 | Philippines:PG-13

Filming Locations:

Beverly Hills, California, USA

Company:

Columbia Pictures Corporation

Trivia:

Walter Matthau's final film.

Goofs:

Factual errors: There is no second floor to the Richard M. Nixon Library in Yorba Linda, California.

Quotes:

Lou Mozell: You know, that I actually met a girl by the name of Moo Goo Gai Pan? That was her last name. Her first name was Freida. Freida Moo Goo Gai Pan. She was half-Jewish, half-Chinese. A lot of people called her the Ori-Yenta.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in "Game K N B: (2007-03-03)" (2007)

Soundtrack:

Singalong Junk

Bittersweet In Many Ways

Some very good performances help this otherwise forgettable film about the relationship between the three daughters (played by Diane Keaton, Meg Ryan and Lisa Kudrow), of a dying man (Walter Matthau.) There isn't anything particularly noteworthy about the story itself. Told largely in flashback style, we see how the father-daughter relationship evolved over the years from a happy, loving one through the breakup of the parents and into the last days before Lou's death. The movie features fairly typical scenarios of the types of things that might cause family breakdowns (divorce, alcoholism, sibling rivalry, etc.) There are some humourous moments, but all in all I found myself largely disappointed by the story.

As I mentioned, though, there were some good performances which lifted this from a bad one to the ranks of mediocre to average. Meg Ryan was particularly good as Eve, the daughter who bears most of the responsibility for caring for Lou. She's guilty of a bit of overacting at times, but is definitely worthy of the leading role. Walter Matthau played Lou very well - but, of course, he should have been accustomed to playing crotchety old men by that point in his career. There were some surprise performances as well. Lisa Kudrow demonstrated more acting ability than I expected from her based on having watched "Friends" a few times, and, in a very limited role, Duke Moosekian was really quite funny as Dr. Omar Kunundar, whose car Eve manages to damage in a car accident. On the negative side, I was also surprised by what I thought was a very below average performance by Diane Keaton (who also directed, and who, in my opinion, showed no great talent as a director.) She simply began to grate after a while.

The best word I can come up with to describe this movie is bittersweet, both in the story of how a seemingly happy family turned out to be so consumed in anger and jealousy, and in the sense that the movie had possibilities, particularly in the strong performances I mentioned, that just didn't seem to add up to anything. Generously, I rated this as a 5/10.