Simply put, this movie sucks out loud. Really, I could hear it sucking from the kitchen two rooms away, which is where I spent most of it fixing myself snacks while Meryl Streep and Clint Eastwood spent much of their time kissing or spouting such embarrassing dialog I almost had to cover my ears.
Everyone knows The Bridges of Madison County was a smash best-selling book in 1992, then was made into a smash film by Eastwood in 1995, who directed himself in it. It's surprising he didn't fire himself since his acting, usually so dependable, was mawkishly amateurish here. And Streep, today's Goddess of Film, was also not up to par, possibly because of the horrid lines she was forced to utter. The one thing that really stood out for me was how pudgy her fingers are. Who knew?
The structure of the film is also ridiculous. Streep's character has died and her adult children come to her Iowa farmhouse to dispense with her will and her belongings, and find a box she left for them telling the story of her four days of love with Eastwood's National Geographic photographer on assignment who came looking for directions and ended up smooching her in a bathtub, of course with candles all around. Oh yeah, her husband and kids were out of town for exactly those days at the county fair, how convenient.
Even the eponymous bridges were unimpressive, a couple of decrepit relics they found somewhere in America. I've seen much better covered bridges in Vermont, and I've had much better love affairs too. This film is basically unwatchable unless maybe you are a 12-year-old girl. And if you are, let me just say that four days of almost continual drinking of beers and brandies with a hot stranger who looks like Clint Eastwood in place of your dumpy husband who walks around like a potato in denim overalls and never talks to you will likely lead to lust, but certainly not the love of your life. Oh please.
So the four days are over and he begs her to go with him but she can't leave her family and instead cries a lot, and you, the viewer, are finally released from 135 minutes of hell.
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