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This is certainly not a movie I would recomend to my less thoughful friends.
I found it to be quite good.
Steve Martin's (Ray) character has the sort of melancholy wistfulness of a man that has mastered most social niceities, achieved material success, but was aided in doing it by becoming emotionally detached.
What is funny is that his character doesn't try and control the people around him, he is just so habitually in control of himself that he only lets himself "feel" to a "limited" degree.
But in a way I am misspeaking myself because he does feel, its that he doesn't recognize, acknowledge or act on what he feels exept in very limited ways.
He's like a person that won't shed tears in the face of outrageous grief and always acts as if he is ok.
So he tells her in the very beginning that he only wants a limited relationship. No strings.
But he does feel deeply and shows it by doing/buying things for the person because he has only learned to view the world through material and tangible objects.
So he pays off Danes's student loans without telling her or making a big deal of it. And buys her nice gifts outside her price range. Its as if every time he gets her something he is saying he loves her, but can't say it outloud.
And then throughout the relationship he does things that will push her away. Almost as if he wants her to leave, as if he is uncomfortable with being too happy.
I generally read a lot of movie reviews and I definitely noticed a difference in what female reviewers and male reviewers focused on. A lot of female reviewers were very focused on the age difference as if that was the centerpoint of the story.
But the true tragedy of the movie wasn't the discrepancy in their ages.
The true tragedy was that Ray couldn't recognize love when he was in it, couldn't accept love when it was freely given, and couldn't acknowledge love until it was lost.
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