This prom-night balloon of a movie floats easily above the year's other exercises in '50s nostalgia. If you dare reach for it, it will land smartly in your heart.
Peggy Sue Got Married (1986)
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:24
Fresh:21
Rotten:3
Average Rating:6.8/10
Synopsis: Francis Ford Coppola's seriocomic drama is the charming tale of middle-aged Peggy Sue Bodell (Kathleen Turner). As an unhappy mother of two, considering divorce from her weasel of a husband, it... Francis Ford Coppola's seriocomic drama is the charming tale of middle-aged Peggy Sue Bodell (Kathleen Turner). As an unhappy mother of two, considering divorce from her weasel of a husband, it doesn't seem like a great time to have to attend her 25-year high school reunion and contemplate all those youthful dreams that didn't come true. But at the party Peggy Sue faints...and wakes up to find herself 18 again and back in high school in 1960, where she gets the chance to "do it all over again." Peggy Sue reveals to her shocked brainy schoolmate Richard Norvik (Barry Miller) some of his future "high-tech" inventions and has a fling with a dreamy Beat poet (Michael Fitzsimmons). Now realizing she has the ability to rearrange her future, she must decide if her true happiness lies with future husband Charlie (Nicolas Cage), a Fabian wannabe. Helen Hunt is Peggy's supportive daughter and Maureen O'Sullivan appears in a small role as the grandmother Peggy gets to revisit. Turner was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actress for her funny, believable role as a woman sent back in time to high school. [More]
Starring: Kathleen Turner, Nicolas Cage, Barry Miller, Catherine Hicks
Starring: Kathleen Turner, Nicolas Cage, Barry Miller, Catherine Hicks, Maureen McVerry, Helen Hunt, Maureen O'Sullivan, Joan Allen, Kevin J. O'Connor, Barbara Harris, Don Murray, Leon Ames, Sofia Coppola, Jim Carrey, Lisa Jane Persky, Lucinda Jenney, Wil Shriner
Director: Francis Ford Coppola
Director: Francis Ford Coppola
Producer: Paul R. Gurian
Screenwriter: Jerry Leichting, Arlene Sarner
Composer: John Barry
Reviews for Peggy Sue Got Married
A charming little comedy grounded in an irresistable performance from Kathleen Turner.
It's grave, lumbering, arrhythmic, and bloated, an emotional hogwallow of catchpenny insights and easy sentimentality.
The movie has many lovely moments and just as many dead spots, but its strengths make this atypical film from Francis Coppola a worthwhile viewing experience.
What makes this treatment unique is that the jokes aren't so much derivative of pop culture, but are instead found in the learned wisdom of a middle-aged woman reacting to her own teenage dilemmas.
Centering on a female protag (well-played by Kathleen Turner) and dealing with a similar universal fantasy of revisiting your past, Coppola's small-town fable is a wonderful companion piece to Back to the Future, which was released a year earlier.
Ignore the ridiculous happy ending of this film, and you have a much more fatalistic exercise in which Coppola eschews easy laughs in favour of the exposure of feeling and the fact that these people's lives, however empty, matter to them.
One of the best romantic comedies of the 80's...."Back to the Future" meets "Somewhere in Time"
A very entertaining and involving movie boasting a cornucopia of delightful comic moments and scenes which go straight for the heart.
Miss Turner's self-assured comic timing goes a long way toward salvaging the film, providing both moral and physical dimension to a role that scarcely exists.
Peggy Sue Got maried isn't a perfect film, but it sure makes you feel good.
Latest News for Peggy Sue Got Married
April 07, 2008:
Nicolas Cage, Kathleen Turner Settle Libel Lawsuit
The lawsuit filed by Nicolas Cage over strange allegations made by Kathleen Turner in her recent memoir has reached its conclusion. More...
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