Nothing in Common

I've still got a couple more movies on my DVR from when Eva Mare Saint was TCM's Star of the Month, so again I'm making a point of watching them before they expire and then putting up a post, although because of how far ahead I'm getting in terms of posting, they may expire by the time the posts go up. Anyhow, next up is a later movie from the mid-1980s, Nothing in Common.

Tom Hanks is the star here, playing David Basner. In an opening scene, he's returning home from a Caribbean vacation to his job at an advertising agency in Chicago. There's he surprised by the new that he's been given a promotion, which in part means a move from a cubicle to an office with a door and a window to the outside world. He's also a ladies' man, as he was putting the moves on one of the stewardesses on the flight home and has an on-again, off-again girlfriend in Chicago in the form drama teacher Donna (Bess Armstrong).

However, life for David is about to get turned upside-down. While he's in bed with a woman, his phone rings. Naturally he lets it go to his answering machine, since this was the 80s and people didn't really have voice mail back then. But he hears that the call is from his father Max (Jackie Gleason). He informs David that David's mom, Max's wife of 36 years Lorraine (Eva Marie Saint) up and left him, and that this clearly isn't some sort of trial separation. So the following day, David has to go see each of his parents, and deal with their complex relationship with one another as well as his own complicated relationship with each of his parents.

Meanwhile, David had been hoping to make parter in the ad agency. To do so means not only making good ads and coming up with good slogans and whatnot, but bringing in new clients, as his boss Charlie (Hector Elizondo) points out. At least there's the chance of landing a big new client, as Colonial Airlines is thinking of a new ad campaign to grow their business. David's agency is understandably hoping to get that contract, and David is the point man on the pitch.

David and the rest of the division do their research, finding that the company is run by somewhat mysterious pilot Andrew Woolridge (Barry Corbin). What is known about Andrew doesn't quite fit David's interests, as is scene in one of the comic relief scenes where David goes on a duck hunt with Andrew and some others, a scene that made me think of Libeled Lady and the remake Easy to Wed. But Nothing in Common is more of a light (for the most part) drama and not a straight-up comedy. Mixing the two is a subplot involving David's having a relationshi with Colonial Airlines bigwig Cheryl (Sela Ward) who turns out to be the daughter of Andrew -- the married daughter, no less.

But the drama really comes in David's relationship with his father. Dad is getting to the age where he should think of retirement, but that's only going to be forced on him by the fact that he's about to get fired from his job selling children's fashions. That, and his health. Max has had diabetes for some time, but never wants to see a doctor. As a result, he has a medical emergency that's going to require surgery. At the very least, there's going to be some toes amputated; at worst the surgery could go bad and Dad could die on the operating table.

I have to admit to not having heard about Nothing in Common before I saw it show up on the TCM schedule last summer. I think that's because it's the sort of movie that doesn't seem to show up much. It got mixed reviews at the time, and as a middle-brow drama doesn't have anything about it to make it especially memorable the way other genre movies might. That's a shame, because while it's not a great movie, I think it's certainly better than "mixed reviews" might lead you to believe. Everybody does a professional job, with Hanks taking a big step in moving out from just the straight comedy roles he had done to this point.

Especially if you're of the age to have elderly parents, I think you'll enjoy Nothing in Common.