{"id":4182,"date":"2024-09-24T02:49:45","date_gmt":"2024-09-24T02:49:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/?p=4182"},"modified":"2024-10-13T19:49:39","modified_gmt":"2024-10-13T23:49:39","slug":"somebody-killed-her-husband","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/2024\/09\/24\/somebody-killed-her-husband\/","title":{"rendered":"Somebody Killed Her Husband"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Somebody Killed Her Husband<\/strong> (1978)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Columbia\/Comedy-Thriller\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 97 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated PG (language, violence)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Lamont Johnson\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Reginald Rose\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Alex North\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Andrew Laszlo and Ralf D. Bode\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: September 29, 1978 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Farrah Fawcett-Majors, Jeff Bridges, John Wood, Tammy Grimes, John Glover, Patricia Elliott, Mary McCarty, Laurence Guittard, Vincent Robert Santa Lucia, Beeson Carroll.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Box Office: $6.1M (US)<\/p>\n

Rating<\/strong>: *<\/p>\n

\u00a0It\u2019s odd, but I can\u2019t seem to find a lot of information on Somebody Killed Her Husband<\/strong>, a comedic thriller that opened in cinemas in fall 1978. It was supposed to be huge as it marked the first starring role of ex-Charlie\u2019s Angels star Farrah Fawcett-Majors (as she was known back then). It didn\u2019t do that well with audiences or critics. It closed after a short run.<\/p>\n

\u00a0I saw Somebody Killed Her Husband<\/strong> on network TV a couple of years later. It\u2019s the only time I ever saw it. It never aired on cable as far as I know. It was scheduled to show on Cinemax in August \u201986, but they pulled it. It never came out on video or DVD as far as I know. I never saw it on the shelves at any of my regular video stores or available to order on Amazon. It was as elusive as the Lily Tomlin-John Travolta romantic drama Moment by Moment, also released in \u201978.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Prior to this past weekend, I vaguely remembered two scenes from Somebody Killed Her Husband<\/strong>: (1) the scene where Fawcett\u2019s character finds her husband\u2019s dead body with a knife sticking out of it and (2) the finale in a warehouse filled with giant toys. I thought I hit the proverbial jackpot when I discovered it was playing on the free streaming service Tubi. Naturally, I didn\u2019t hesitate when it came time to choose Saturday night\u2019s feature film. I was elated to finally be seeing it. Elation turned to regret long before the end credits roll.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Although Fawcett is billed as the star of the show, that dubious honor belongs to Jeff Bridges (King Kong) who plays Jerry, a struggling children\u2019s book author who earns his daily bread in the toy department at Macy\u2019s department store in NYC. That\u2019s where he has his meet-cute with Jenny (Fawcett), a gorgeous woman with a toddler. Oh yeah, she\u2019s also married. That doesn\u2019t stop Jerry from pursuing her romantically. It\u2019s fine with Jenny because she isn\u2019t happily <\/em>married. Her husband (Guittard, A Little Night Music) is a bore who only talks about work. He\u2019s in insurance and we all know how exciting that it is, right?<\/p>\n

\u00a0ANYWAY, Jerry and Jenny start seeing each other on the sly. One night, she brings him to her place to share some Chinese food and a little loving. Their plans are interrupted when the husband comes home unexpectedly. They hear him talking to somebody then nothing. They go downstairs where they find him dead in the kitchen with a knife in his back. Naturally, they freak out. Jenny wants to call the cops. Jerry tells her if she does that, they\u2019ll be accused of murdering him. His solution is to hide the body in the freezer and find the killer themselves. Now that\u2019s a good idea…. NOT!<\/p>\n

\u00a0I didn\u2019t know Somebody Killed Her Husband<\/strong> was supposed to be a comedy. I only realized it when I looked at the Wikipedia entry after watching it. No, scratch that. I endured it. Either way, it explains why Jerry and Jenny act like idiots the whole time. It\u2019s supposed to be funny except it\u2019s not. I didn\u2019t laugh once. I did shake my head a lot though if that counts.<\/p>\n

\u00a0It doesn\u2019t work as a whodunit thriller either. I knew who the killer was the minute the player\u2019s name appeared in the opening credits. My suspicion was further confirmed by the character\u2019s intro. Roger Ebert\u2019s \u201cLaw of Economy of Characters\u201d states that no character in a mystery movie is unimportant no matter how insignificant they initially appear to be. The person in question, played by a known name, shows up briefly then disappears until the end when it comes time for the big reveal. Even so, director Lamont Johnson (Lipstick) throws in a lot of red herrings like Jenny\u2019s affluent neighbors Ernest (Wood, WarGames) and Audrey (Grimes, Can\u2019t Stop the Music), an odd couple with a secret pastime they must have learned from Richard Nixon.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Bridges is better than this. He\u2019s certainly better than the material deserves. Professional that he is, the actor nonetheless brings his A-game to Somebody Killed Her Husband<\/strong>. He has a likable, relatable quality with which he imbues his characters. It\u2019s too bad it\u2019s not enough to save this rapidly sinking ship. After a while, you wish he\u2019d come to his senses and get the police involved. Instead, he keeps getting himself and his newly single girlfriend in deeper- i.e. more murders occur. Jerry is what\u2019s commonly known here in the City of Brotherly Loe as a \u201csmacked-ass\u201d (look it up).<\/p>\n

\u00a0Somebody Killed Her Husband<\/strong> may be Fawcett\u2019s first starring role in a feature film, but it\u2019s not her first gig. She previously appeared in the notorious 1970 stinker Myra Breckinridge and the 1976 sci-fi piece Logan\u2019s Run. The TV detective series Charlie\u2019s Angels propelled her to stardom. What male didn\u2019t have her famous poster on his bedroom wall in the 70s? She\u2019s beautiful, no question, but her acting abilities leave a lot to be desired. She\u2019s terrible in Somebody Killed Her Husband<\/strong>. Not a single word that comes from her mouth sounds the least bit convincing. She has no chemistry with Bridges at all. It\u2019s clearly forced on both their parts.<\/p>\n

\u00a0What can I say about the supporting cast? I know there are a lot of weirdos, wackos and wing nuts in New York, but the New Yorkers in Somebody Killed Her Husband<\/strong> are like beings from another planet. The aforementioned neighbors are bad enough, but wait until you get a load of Jerry\u2019s co-worker and sort of girlfriend Helene (Elliott, One Life to Live). Her character sounds like she spends all of her off-time on a therapist\u2019s couch. We\u2019ve all dated some odd people, but this woman is a real doozy. No wonder Jerry goes running into the arms of a married woman.<\/p>\n

\u00a0There are wall-to-wall miscalculations in Somebody Killed Her Husband<\/strong>, but the topper has to be the ending. No. I\u2019m not referring to the final where Jerry and Jenny face off against the killer in the basement of Macy\u2019s where they store all the floats for their annual Thanksgiving Day parade although it is definitely weird. No, I\u2019m talking about the closing credits where we get a montage of the stars\u2019 scenes together while a sappy love song by Neil Sedaka (\u201cLove Keeps Getting Stronger Every Day\u201d) plays on the soundtrack. What in the actual f***? Words fail me here.<\/p>\n

\u00a0I can see why the studio wasn\u2019t anxious to keep Somebody Killed Her Husband<\/strong> in circulation. It\u2019s a bad movie. Johnson can\u2019t seem to strike the right balance between murder mystery and rom-com. Both elements end up cancelling each other out. What we\u2019re left with is a movie from the 70s that\u2019s best left forgotten. Fortunately, it didn\u2019t kill the stars\u2019 careers. Bridges went onto make great films like Starman, Jagged Edge, The Big Lebowski and Hell or High Water (to name but a few). The late Fawcett did too, going onto to an Emmy nomination for her role as a battered wife in The Burning Bed (1984). Good for them! They\u2019ve long since washed the stink of Somebody Killed Her Husband<\/strong> off of them. I\u2019m just happy I finally got to see it. That\u2019s one more title off my movie bucket list.\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Somebody Killed Her Husband (1978)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Columbia\/Comedy-Thriller\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 97 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated PG (language, violence)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Lamont Johnson\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Reginald Rose\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Alex North\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Andrew Laszlo and Ralf D. Bode\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: September 29, 1978 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Farrah Fawcett-Majors, Jeff Bridges, John Wood, Tammy Grimes, John Glover, Patricia Elliott, Mary McCarty, Laurence Guittard, Vincent Robert Santa […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":5287,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4182","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-comedies","category-this-sucks-so-bad"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/Somebody-Killed-Her-Husband.jpg?fit=620%2C348&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4182","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4182"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4182\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5288,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4182\/revisions\/5288"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5287"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4182"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4182"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4182"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}