Always

Independent filmmaker Henry Jaglom's fifth film chronicles the breakup of his marriage to Patrice Townsend. Always is more fact than fiction: Jaglom and Townsend play the leads, the supporting cast is made up of friends, and the film was shot in the house the Jagloms lived in when they were married. The first fifteen minutes are strained--with sexist Jaglom lording it (in a very condescending way) over Townsend during their supposed final meal together. When problems arise with the signing of the divorce papers and Townsend takes suddenly ill, the couple spend the Fourth of July weekend together with two other couples. With the arrival of the other couples--one about to be married, one happily (?) married--Jaglom's design begins to fall into place. The remainder of the film is a ruthlessly honest dissection in the stages of many a modern marriage: the innocence, the betrayal, the pain, the destruction of both one's self and others. Jaglom's films have always had a very unadorned non-Hollywood look, and this film is no exception. But, here as before, the primitivism is a perfect vehicle for conveying the honesty of the emotions--and, in Always those emotions run the gamut. Recommended.