The Man Who Loved Women ** (1983, Burt Reynolds, Julie Andrews, Kim Basinger, Sela Ward, Marilu Henner, Cynthia Sikes, Jennifer Edwards) – Classic Movie Review 7567

In 1983 it seemed almost inevitable that the project of Americanising François Truffaut’s 1977 French romantic comedy L’Homme Qui Aimait Les Femmes (The Man Who Loved Women) would fall to director Blake Edwards and that he would cast Burt Reynolds as the titular Man Who Loved Women, now called David Fowler.

This time the character is a successful middle aged Hollywood-based sculptor who takes his obsession with women to a shrink, but then finds that she too is a female – Marianna, played by Julie Andrews.

Both director Edwards and star Reynolds are significantly out of place and out of their comfort zone. Edwards cannot indulge his prodigious talent for slapstick comedy with this story. And, though Reynolds convinces as the womaniser, he does not seem at ease with the tricky material.

Nor does Edwards’s wife Julie Andrews seem at ease, playing Reynolds’s psychiatrist Marianna, a Los Angeles based therapist who narrates the hero’s story. Yet there is nevertheless enough going on between Reynolds and Andrews to believe that they would be good together with a different script.

Perhaps inevitably, The Man Who Loved Women is a rather awkward film. But it is pleasant enough, even if script problems keep it from reaching its full potential.

Also in the cast are Kim Basinger, Marilu Henner, Cynthia Sikes, Jennifer Edwards, Sela Ward, Ellen Bauer, Denise Crosby, Tracy Vaccaro and Barry Corbin.

The Man Who Loved Women is directed by Blake Edwards, runs 110 minutes, is made by Delphi, is released by Columbia, is written by Blake Edwards, Milton Wexler and Geoffrey Edwards, based on the story by François Truffaut, Michel Fermaud and Suzanne Schiffman, is shot by Haskell Wexler, is produced by Blake Edwards and Tony Adams, and is scored by Henry Mancini, with Production Design by Rodger Maus.

© Derek Winnert 2018 Classic Movie Review 7567

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