Dubious Battle

By J.C.

THE WAR BETWEEN MEN AND WOMEN

Directed by MELVILLE SHAVELSON Screenplay by MELVILLE SHAVELSON and DANNY ARNOLD

According to the credits, The War Between Men and Women was "suggested by the writings and drawings of James Thurber." Peter Wilson, the hero of the movie, resembles Thurber in that he is half blind and a cartoonist; Wilson's drawings, shown in several sequences of the film, are closely adapted from Thurber's own. But there ends any meaningful connection in plot or spirit to the life of the late cartoonist.

Portrayed by Jack Lemmon, Wilson is a bileful Manhattan bachelor just entering middle age. When we first encounter him, in fact, he is lying in bed mouthing halfhearted paeans on the joys of bachelorhood to the world at large. In the time-honored tradition of bachelors who gloat early in a show, Wilson will soon be posting the banns--somewhere in the second reel, in fact. His intended is one Terry Kozlenko (Barbara Harris), who supports three children and a yapping mongrel on alimony checks. Once wed, Wilson is beset by miseries. His stepchildren are a mess. The boy is prey to countless nighttime fears, the younger of the two daughters stammers, and the older displays unmistakable signs of nymphomania. Terry's ex-husband (Jason Robards) visits disruptively. The dog snarls.

As the hero's life worsens, so do his eyes. Scorning pity--and grateful to get out of the house--Wilson enters the hos pital for an operation that checks his on coming blindness but leaves him only barely sighted, though able to draw. His first opus after the operation is an antiwar parable, actually Thurber's The Last Flower, which the film makers have seen fit to animate. When Wilson's young stepdaughter visits him one day and sees the cartoon, her stammer is cured. Reconciliation with Terry can not be far behind.

Having reduced Thurber to a my opic misanthrope and the plot to a sentimental muddle, Director Shavelson gets better acting than he deserves. The cast makes a brave fight of it, and there is an especially fine and funny cameo by Herb Edelman, who plays Wilson's agent. While Wilson and wife war with each other over the impending operation, the agent sits with them at a restaurant table, blubbering and sobbing "the courage, the devotion," oblivious to the fact that the marriage is crumbling around him.

sbJ.C.

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