Days of Wine and Roses (1962)

Joe Clay (Jack Lemmon), is a hard-drinking public relations man in San Francisco. Though he gets off on the wrong foot when he first meets Kirsten Arnesen (Lee Remick) by mistaking her for a party girl attracted to men with money, he manages to win her over and get a date. Kirsten, who adores chocolate but doesn’t drink, is introduced to a Brandy Alexander (yum!) by Joe and is conveniently converted to a drinker. Once they are married and have a baby, Joe who is dissatisfied with how his career is turning out is still adamant about drinking and having a good time. He yells at Kirsten for not wanting to support him in this venture because of the baby. To appease him, she too starts to drink and months later she not only can match him drink for drink but she enjoys doing it on her own- so much so that she accidentally sets their apartment on fire.

Joe Clay (Jack Lemmon), is a hard-drinking public relations man in San Francisco. Though he gets off on the wrong foot when he first meets Kirsten Arnesen (Lee Remick) by mistaking her for a party girl attracted to men with money, he manages to win her over and get a date. Kirsten, who adores chocolate but doesn’t drink, is introduced to a Brandy Alexander (yum!) by Joe and is conveniently converted to a drinker. Once they are married and have a baby, Joe who is dissatisfied with how his career is turning out is still adamant about drinking and having a good time. He yells at Kirsten for not wanting to support him in this venture because of the baby. To appease him, she too starts to drink and months later she not only can match him drink for drink but she enjoys doing it on her own- so much so that she accidentally sets their apartment on fire.

After losing several jobs within the next 4 years, Joe realizes that he and Kirsten are alcoholics and sets out to put them on the wagon. They move in with Kirsten's father and help him run his nursery while staying sober for a month. But one night, as a reward for being so good, they go on a bender that ends up with Joe destroying the greenhouse and ending up in the hospital to dry out. This is where he meets Jim Hungerford (Jack Klugman), an ex-addict, who encourages him to join Alcoholics Anonymous. Realizing that he and Kirsten are doomed as long as she refuses to admit to her alcoholism, Joe makes the decision to turn away from Kirsten, reestablish his career, and raise their daughter on his own.

Anyone who has not seen this film should definitely do so! Lemmon is absolutely fantastic in this dramatic role. The controversial subject, something that must have seemed so new and raw to mass audiences when it first came out, is still completely absorbing today. You can’t go wrong with a film about people’s lives that completely come apart the way Joe and Kirsten’s do. And to think, Joe makes a complete turn around while Kirsten, who is the way she is solely because of Joe, is still fumbling in the dark and yet both, despite their past actions and decisions, are still able to elicit sympathy from people like me who have no idea what it’s like to be so utterly ruled by a vice.

Side note:

To ready himself for his role in Days of Wine and Roses, Lemmon went to AA meetings and watched alcoholics drying out in hospitals. He became so immersed in the straitjacket scene that director Blake Edwards had to shake him quiet for several minutes after the cameras stopped rolling.

Tonight on TCM! Redgrave is pretty awesome in this movie!

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