It is such a fantastic movie. I fell in love with all the characters and the plot was unpredictable. The setting was perfect, also. I definitely recommend this to anyone who hasn't seen it.
Henry Fonda and Katharine Hepburn totally deserve their Best Actor/Actress Academy Award they won; they both give faultless performances that will touch everyone's hearth. This story is not the most original story ever made, but I can assure you it will deeply move you.
Billy Williams definately deserved the Oscar for the cinematography. National Geographic, eat your heart out.
That out of the way lets get to the meat and potatoes: Hank Fonda and Kate Hepburn. Both won Oscars for their roles and I can see why. Fonda's Norman Thayer is the nucleus of the story because the only conflict is the absent relationship he has never had with his middle-aged daughter played convincingly by none other than Jane Fonda. I'm sensing there were some major personal experience brought to those two roles due to the connection Henry had with his Hanoi Jane daughter during the late 1960's. Henry Fonda also has many knee-slapping one line jokes that break up the drama.
One line that stands out comes from Ms. Hepburn in a dialogue with Chelsea (Jane Fonda): "Don't you think everybody looks back on their childhood with some resentment?" This is a great line delivered by a great actress in a damn good movie.
This is a real cllassic. I think this was the 1st adlut movie I can ever remember seeing as a kid (MY parent liked the movie alot). I thought heck and hell and shit were the worst words i had ever heard.
To concentrate in majority on Fonda and Hepburn is obviously pointless, because they are they are both perfect here.
My complaints, for the film, lie in the dialouge and the music. "Trite" as the plot below says is how I feel about the dialouge at certain times. But, you can only really feel it in Jane Fonda's performance. Henry and Katharine can see past it, thankfully. It is Ms. Fonda who, in a way, ruins the movie for me. She is obviously trying to live up to both of these screen giants (futility at its best). And, it also could be the troubles with her dad translating on-screen. I guess Woody Allen might be right: life imitates bad television, and thus reality lends itself to melodramatic tones and puffy eyes in her time onscreen. Yet, it is only she who seems 2-dimensional, flat, and bland.
The music is also a bit of annoyance, bombastically bringing itself in in places where it isn't needed. I mean, these two leads could've put on one-man shows in cardboard boxes and still beat out the other four Oscar nominees. After the beginning, the score does die down, but my gosh is it annoyingly cliche in the first 20 or so minutes.
The ending is the scene that really hooked me on this film. T.S. Eliot said it best when he realized that words are inadequate; that is exactly how I feel about this scene. The pain captured on Hepburn's face is like no other I've ever seen on film or in real life. It is knowing, understanding. Wisdom and years lie behind it. It is though we are seeing this couple's whole life flash across her eyes, and the realization that she might have to live out the rest of hers alone. But keenly, it is Fonda who brings a smile back into her eyes and the scene back to life with a husky laugh which means a whole lot more in its essence than its appearance.
Recommended to those who need an example of what true acting (and love) is.
I watched this for my Adulthood and Aging class and was pleasantly surprised with the entertainment value. The only thing that was really bothering me is the wayyyy dated music. Takes me right out of the mood. The casting is fun: two greats and a real life father-daughter team who famously have a real-life troubled relationship. The other flaw is the rather simplistic family psychology. But the film is well acted and surprisingly funny.
One of the finest films ever made,starring 2 of Hollywoods most talented and enduring artists-Hepburn and Fonda...and Fonda.Moving and real,refreshingly non Hollywood.
Henry Fonda offers an amazing, and last performance. The tension between Father and Daughter was palpable and supposedly a reflection of their off-screen relationship, as well.
If you want an interesting look at relationship, give this film a watch. The chemistry between all the actors, but particularly Hepburn and Henry Fonda, was fantastic. Without it, the film would have been a total flop. But that chemistry drives the film and makes it a great success. Like most plays that are adapted to film, this story could be interpreted and analyzed for days. I particularly liked the dual theme of an old man dealing with aging and death and a young man dealing with coming of age. I identified strongly with Jane Fonda's character, especially her negative attributes. Funny, moving, simply charming! I wish that I could visit Golden Pond.
Relatively, a bit weak. I hoped for a deep tearjerker, instead I saw a tearjerker with too-pure refreshing moments. Fonda and Hepburn were wonderful actors in this film. It will make you choke up, but it is not as somber as you might think it is.
Slow start builds nicely to this film, wholly responsible for the Lifetime network and every "very special episode" in 80's sit-com history. Academy Awards for Director (Redford), Supporting Actor (Hutton), Adapted Screenplay and Best Picture, with two additional nods for Supporting Actor (Judd Hirsch) and Supporting Actress (Mary Tyler Moore) and an overlooked Donald Sutherland make this well worth your time. The scenes with Hutton and Hirsch were obviously an inspiration to Damon and Affleck when writing Good Will Hunting.
Awesome movie. Henry Fonda is the most hilarious crotchety old guy that I've ever seen! I laughed so hard at so many of his spectacular comebacks and unabashedly mean little remarks. Loved this movie so much.
Not a lot of excitement, but a whole lifetime of meaning. I thought Henry Fonda and Katherine Hepburn were terrific as the aging couple whose life gets invaded by an unwelcome youngster. In the end, he is very welcome to them indeed, and they to him.
Henry Fonda is so crotchety and grumbly and yet so adorable. Katherine Hepburn is so strong and caring. I wasn't as impressed by Jane's performance in this one. But overall, the movie fills you with a sense of peace and love of life and acceptance of death.
In anyone else's hands, this film could have ended up being over-sentimental Sunday afternoon fodder, but thanks to some genius casting it is a very poignant and haunting little film. Henry Fonda and Katherine Hepburn possibly give their greatest performances of their careers here, with some cracking dialogue to work with and an emotional touch that only the greats can successfully execute. Despite its sepia-like warmth, there are also plenty of moments of humour, and the genius moment in the whole thing is when the leads manage to inject laughter into such a tear-jerking finale, just the same as some of our own hidden moments in life.
"On Golden Pond" is simply an old-fashioned testimonial to long-lost youth and facing one's mortality, and, in its simplicity, becomes a life-affirming valentine to those who feel that time has become the enemy - a seemingly ageless, universal perception. If not for the magnificent acting duet between Henry Fonda and Katharine Hepburn, this lovely, sentient piece would have been ignored by most moviegoers. But buoyed by these two acting legends, it manages to circumnavigate the heavy, mawkish waters -- rising far above and beyond anybody's expectation. On Golden Pond is vibrant, emotional, and so heartfelt, it is impossible not to like.
a wonderful picture and a lasting tribute to Henry Fonda it was a warm movie and showed all sides of aging and the love of two old people and how they can love learn to re love their children and even a grand kid loved the ludes (birds)
witty dialogue from henry fonda who's on par with katharine hepburn here in a drama about building bridges with family and growing old. i especially liked the way fonda managed to create an atmosphere of keeping everybody on their toes. very well done film. i know it's so wrong but how can katharine hepburn still be so attractive to me in this film when she's so old in it?
Surprisingly i never thought that a movie with two old people talking through half the movie will be such a delightful experience. Henry Fonda's performance was excellent and enough to be called one of my all time favourites. He made me cry. I didn't quite see the oscar in Hepburn's performance. The score is amazing.
"It's me, you old poop!" I never had any interest in seeing this, but I caught it by chance on TCM, and WOW...I loved it. The performances were brilliant. What a happy accident. :)
No one creates tension like Henry Fonda: everything he touches is so terse, as a viewer, you're just waiting for the other shoe to drop. This is a good film - a little hoky, but a solid adaptation of the play, which always seems cornier. This was Fonda's last role, and what a way to go out - starring with Katharine Hepburn (whose performance is also solid) and his daughter too - he won the academy award for best actor, and died within five months. Class ending for a class act.
Awww. If you just need a feel gooder, rent this gem from the early 80s. Henry Fonda and Katherine Hepburn have just about the best onscreen chemistry I've ever seen, they're a married couple in their 70s and 80s, and they could not be any sweeter. It's a tear jerker, so beware, but I had read the play and thought it was so sweet and well, I don't know that it could have been any sweeter. You really have to see it for those two actors -- I realized how shameful it was that I hadn't ever seen anything with Katherine Hepburn in it before. Shame. Fixing that ASAP.
Ethel: Listen to me, mister. You're my knight in shining armor. Don't forget it. You're going to get back on that horse and I'm going to be right behind you, holding on tight and away we're going to go, go, go!
MCT:September 10, 2008
MCT:August 15, 2008
MCT:July 6, 2008
MCT:May 31, 2008
MCT:November 20, 2007
