The Foursome (2006) Reviews

• Additions Take Away from Film

  Bologna King2007-05-30

  Norm Foster is Canada's most popular playwright, and The Foursome one of his more popular plays. It's a play that presents a good opportunity for a screen adaptation, but is a challenging play to adapt. The play takes place exclusively at the tee of each of the eighteen holes of a golf course, involves only four characters and consists almost entirely of dialogue. A film using the play as a screenplay would be dull indeed, as the audience expects the film to use its ability to show us different scenes and more complex action to tell the story. This screenplay fails to translate the play effectively to the screen, and for two main reasons. First, the play is an ensemble work--the merciless macho banter of the golfers touches nerves in all four characters and forces them to justify their lives. Here there is a focus on the character of Rick which skews the balance among the characters. Second, the adapter has added the characters of the golfers' wives and invented subplots and interactions among them, added a gay course marshal, added a chase scene involving golf carts and added an extra 18 holes of golf. None of these additions help the real point of the story which is the exposure of the reality of the golfers' lives (often kept as carefully guarded secrets). While making room for all of this rubbish, the screenwriter has cut away plot point after plot point from the stage play, effectively gutting the characters, especially Ted, Donnie and Cam, and leaving empty caricatures. At the same time the carefully laid foundations in the play have been so eroded that the characters' actions (and especially the denouement) seem arbitrary rather than natural for them. For an example, in the play we hear that Rick gave Donnie a wedgie at the reunion. Instead of showing us this incident, which tells us a lot about Rick and Donnie and their relationship, and which would be effective cinematically, the whole event disappears. Bits of Foster's dialogue float to the surface from time to time but usually missing context and sometimes missing the punchline. An exception is Rick's plan to sell Brazilian Pepper Trees which arrives intact and hilarious. Considering the weak script, the actors made a reasonably good job of this. I was particularly impressed with Paul Jarrett's Ted (the role Foster himself played in the theatrical debut) and with Nicole Oliver as Cam's wife Lori. Production values were mostly solid throughout. I thought the opening titles, though clever, were a little hard to read. Generally this was a squandered opportunity to do a really good adaptation of a very good play. A pity.

• Pretty bad movie...

  jocedeg2007-01-17

  For my part, this movie is a waste of time. The tone goes from semi-comic to slapstick and the characters are all stereotypes: a clumsy fat guy, a bitter, aging, alcoholic millionaire, a sexually frustrated salesman and the playboy con-man. The main problem is that these four guys don't even look like they're very close in age, but they are supposed to be university buddies. The movie's production values seem very low: the golf course look more like a big park. Most of the time, you see them swing but it doesn't feel like there's a ball on the grass. Amateur stuff all the way. But the biggest problem is that none of the characters are very sympathetic to begin with. The wives don't bring a lot to the story, except more stereotypical banter that sound more like 90's talk than actual 2005 realities. All the jokes fall flat. There's even an embarrassing "stunt" sequence that features the worst "matched-to-the-actress" stunt woman in history doing the worst bit of stunt driving you could imagine: if you have the courage the see this movie, your jaw will drop when you get to that sequence ! All these little details completely took me out of the movie. As for the acting, Dillon is in "Entourage" mode and the unknown around him act like sitcom extras. Maybe they tried to get a "Big Chill for the New Millennium" feel, but it doesn't connect with me, a guy who's about their age. They even insert a painfully "cliché" gay character who is completely ridiculous, but in a way, that's OK: he's just as bad as the rest of the characters. Bad movie based on a bad play. Skip !

• This golf movie is way of out bounds

  illsmart56-12007-05-23

  This is another 20-minute rental. Even at that, you wonder why it took you so long to hit the OFF button. The only reason I even rented this stinker is because it involved golf. Four buddies get together for a college reunion and a round of golf. The reunion sets up one 'hilarious' moment and gives you a peak at the heroes and their lives. The golf just gives them a reason to drink and complain. When are they going to give actors a golf lesson before casting them in a golf movie. The on-course action was somewhat realistic, just not funny or entertaining. The duffer duffed, the stud hit bombs away and the foils were predictably foiled. The reunion stuff had been done far better in any number of movies, not all of those good. For four best friends, there seemed no camaraderie at all. And yet, this movie was not bad enough to even make fun of. And certainly not good enough to watch for very long. Do yourself a favor -- rent Golf Balls instead. At least, while the jokes are lame, the women are hot.

• Nothing funny or clever here

  no_spm_brazil2007-08-18

  In a nutshell: bad clichés, recycled jokes, bad characters. Nothing really to see here. Not the worst movie ever, but in the genre of golf comedies...maybe? If you've ever golfed you will have heard every joke, and if not, well...probably not funny. Even the other jokes and skits same old recycled jokes you might hear from a middle school kid. So much for originality. Otherwise, not a lot of substance here so not much else to comment on. In fact, this is the only time I've ever struggled to fill the minimum 10 lines of text.

• Poor representation of the original

  seetacat2007-06-25

  As someone who has performed Norm Foster's The Foursome on stage, I was intrigued to see a movie version of the play. I was very disappointed in the result. I enjoy Norm's work and it is always well received by audiences. This play doesn't represent Norm's work at all and very much of the material that is enjoyed by the live audience was deleted. The female characters are much larger and more interesting when left to the audience's imagination. Not that I was disappointed with the ladies performances, they did the best they could with what they had! It is really too bad that this movie couldn't be more true to the play.