Bright performances elevate this inconsequential script about female bonding into diverting if unmemorable entertainment.
Reno Nevada, "Divorce capital of America," is the meeting place for two dissimilar women. Pen (Stockard Channing) is a middle-aged woman distraught by the end of her marriage to Victor (Stuart Wilson), who withheld emotional support and had an affair with a younger woman. Edie (Jennifer Tilly) is
an outgoing younger woman divorcing the husband she hasn't seen in years in order to marry her new boyfriend.
Having completed their courtroom formalities, Edie and Pen strike up a conversation in a bar, mostly to evade the unwanted attentions of a trio of local cowboys. They also meet Harry (Scott Glenn), a local pharmacist and philanderer whose wife has just left him.
After bonding with stories of their most embarrassing moments, Edie and Pen go out for a night on the town. But when Pen discovers that Edie's fiancee is her now ex-husband, she returns to her hotel room. Harry follows and tries to seduce her, but she falls asleep.
The next morning, everyone heads to the airport. Edie learns the truth about Pen and Victor, but decides to marry him anyway, even though he lied to her. Pen and Edie agree to remain friends, and Harry persuades Pen to stay with him in Reno.
"Why can't men love us the way we love them?" weeps one of the two title characters in a line of dialogue indicative of EDIE AND PEN's TV-movie feminism. The utter lack of irony, or even self-awareness, of giving this line to a woman who has just said that she wants nothing more from a man than a
house and babies is typical of a genre that panders to its audience as relentlessly as Zalman King does to his.
That aside, EDIE AND PEN isn't nearly as strident as it might have been, which may mean it lacks the courage of its male-bashing convictions but at least makes it watchable. Jennifer Tilly plays pretty much the same role she always plays, and even if it's not much of a stretch, she continues to do
it with buoyant charm. Better is Stockard Channing, an attractive actress too often made dowdy in movies that can't seem to believe that brains and beauty aren't mutually exclusive. If only this made-for-cable feature gave them something more substantive to do together, instead of wasting time
with a gaggle of pointless celebrity cameos. (Sexual situations, adult situations, profanity.) leave a comment
