Days of Wine and Roses | | Cast : | Jack Lemmon, Lee Remick, Charles Bickford, Jack Klugman | | Director : | Blake Edwards | | Studio : | Warner Home Video | | Format : | Color | | Released Date : | December 26, 1962 | | DVD Released Date : | January 06, 2004 | | Language : | English (Dubbed), French (Subtitled), English (Subtitled), Spanish (Subtitled), English (Original Language) | | Audience Rating : | Unrated | | | BUY THIS DVD FROM AMAZON |
Customer Reviews
| Rating |  | | Date | August 26, 2005 | | Summary | Graphic portrayal of the ugliness of alcoholism | Content
 | Blake Edwards Days of Wine and Roses is a sobering and gritty representation of the desperate and often unforgiving world of alcoholism. Edwards does not restrain himself in showing the utter destruction of life wrought by the bottle.
Public relations agent Joe Clay played by Jack Lemmon is an alcoholic, spawned by the rigors of entertaining his clients. He becomes enamored with the lovely Lee Remick playing secretary of one of his clients, Kirsten Arnesen. Remick, a wholesome girl and teetotaler is wooed by Lemmon and they eventually marry. As part of the arrangement Lemmon seduces her to alcohol and they both are now addicted.
The resposibility of parenthood does not curb their ugly habit and their lives quickly spiral out of control. Lemmon proceeds to lose job after job and they deteriorate into a sordid existence. They make several aborted attempts for sobriety aided by Remicks nurturing father, landscaper Ellis Arnesen played passionately by craggy veteran actor Charles Bickford.
Both Remick and Lemmon revert back to drinking with Lemmon winding up straight jacketed in a padded cell in a detox ward.
Lemmon aided by Alcoholics Anonymous sponsor Jim Hungerford played by Jack Klugman finally is able to conquer his demons and remain sober. Remick however at movies end is regretably not ready to follow the same path, foresaking both her marriage and child for the comfort of the bottle.
Both Remick and Lemmon give stark and frighteningly realistic acting performances as the unfortunate Mr. & Mrs. Clay. The scene where Lemmon tears apart his father in laws greenhouse searching for a hidden bottle of booze is particularly effective. Under Edwards steady hand, Days of Wine and Roses is the most powerful revelation of alcoholism since the gripping The Lost Weekend. |
| Rating | | | Date | June 14, 2005 | | Summary | The bottom of Hell is a Brandy Alexander bubble bath | Content
| Alcoholism is a disease. Fine. And yet wrong. The disease is obsessivity, the fact that some people cannot live within satisfying an obsession of some kind. And I am afraid everyone has a degree of obsessivity that could lead to a catastrophe in many situations. The problem is the object of this obsessivity. It is dangerous if it is excessive and aiming at an object that destroys your willpower, your selfcontrol, your selfesteem. It can be alcohol. It can be tobacco. It can be eating. It can be coffee or tea or any spft drink. It can be any illicit drug. It can be any medical and legal drug. It can be work. It can be absolutely anything. Many of those things are not dangerous but some can be deadly both for the person concerned by the obsession and for the people around the person. Fast driving is just the same. And this obessivity becomes dangerous when one is addicted to the object of the obsession. Addiction is the worst thing that may happen to a sane person. But don't forget that addiction, any addiction is rooted in the deepest layers of one's personality, in his or her deepest past, in her or his most intimate experiences. There are only two ways to deal with such a problem. Either to look for the real deeper cause and solve the problem there, if it is solvable, or to keep away from the object of the obsession, in this case alcohol, and that cannot be achieved without the help of people around you. Alcoholism is the derangement of a personality in a social environment and it can only be solved with the willpower of the person supported by the society around him or her. But we must always remember that one is no longer an alcoholic when he does not feel any desire to drink when confronted to the very object of this potential desire, i.e. alcohol. If he lives in a totally alcohol-free environment he may only be a sober alcoholic, and if he comes across alcohol again and accepts to be tempted the relapse is a hundred times worse than the first binge. One is healed when one can keep alcohol away even when alcohol is there is front of one's eyes. There is no merit not to fall to temptation if there is no temptation. At least that is what Milton used to think and I believe he was deeply right on this question.
Dr Jacques COULARDEAU
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| Rating | | | Date | June 14, 2005 | | Summary | Unforgettable | Content
| The 1962 film DAYS OF WINE AND ROSES, developed from a television play of the same name, is one of the great examples of black-and-white realism in the American cinema. It examines the life of a couple, Joe and Kiersten Clay, who gradually become alcoholics. DAYS OF WINE AND ROSES also seems modern. Surely this was one of the first films to call alcoholism an illness, or to show an AA (Alcoholics Anonymous) meeting. As Joe, Jack Lemmon plays his usual character-type of the basically decent man overwhelmed by the world. Here, though, his situation takes a tragic, not a comic, turn as he drinks chronically to cope and as a result becomes violent in his behavior. As Kiersten, Lee Remick's acting is every bit as brilliant as Lemmon's, particularly in the drunk scenes. Jack Klugman stands out in the supporting part of Jim Hungerford, a tough-looking yet gentle AA representative who refuses to give up on Joe. The movie presents several unforgettable images: Joe and Kiersten gazing out at the river on their first date; Joe becoming hysterical over one misplaced bottle of liquor; Jim wiping Joe's perspired face in the hospital; Joe gazing out his window after a departing Kiersten as a neon bar sign flashes. DAYS OF WINE AND ROSES is a movie which once seen is never forgotten. It is also movie to make the non-drinker (like me) want to never drink. |
| Rating | | | Date | November 02, 2004 | | Summary | Choice of language in DVD's | Content
| I would like to comment on Reviewer's Allen Smalling "Constant Reader," (Chicago, IL United States) - when he said and I quote "THE DAYS OF WINE AND ROSES (1962) is a wonderful film, but this DVD is burdened with an unacceptable Director's Commentary." I would like to know if this gentleman knows that there is a choice of viewing this DVD WITHOUT the director's comment? Sometimes when we put the DVD in the machine it starts in a way we do not like, for example in a foreign language or with the director's commentary. In this case you go to Language, and choose your language and puff goes the director. I give 5 stars to this movie and I pray that they use it in AA groups. |
| Rating | | | Date | October 27, 2004 | | Summary | Lemmon in his best portrait ! | Content
| 1962 was the most difficult year for awarding the Best Actor in all the Academy story . Consider Gregory Peck for To kill a mockingbird (who won with this role) , Peter O'Toole for Lawrence and Jack Lemmon for Days of wine and roses .
To me Peter O'Toole deserved this prize by far but Lemmon even his role was more introspective, tragic and harsh , made the best role of his career playing an alcoholic husband role . Lee Remick was fantastic too , but the sinister moments you watch to Lemmon for instance in the sequence of the garden in the middle of the rain night is simply outstanding .
The script is a perfect circle without any hole . A merciless story which typified many couples in the world .
A classic and bitter film! |
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