David Denby

“Jane Fonda has performed in movies so infrequently in the last few years, and with such puritanical seriousness, that we were in danger of forgetting how many things she does well. It was frustrating to see her in such honorable projects as Godard's Tout Va Bien, Losey's version of The Doll's House, and the documentary on North Vietnam, Introduction to the Enemy, she made with Tom Hayden and Haskell Wexler, because her political and feminist beliefs were clearly acting to suppress a significant part of her personality. Jane Fonda, one of the most gifted dramatic actresses of her generation, may also be the sexiest comedienne of her generation. Years ago, in junk like Barefoot in the Park and Barbarella, she was naughty in a style that was new to American movies. She didn't snarl like Jean Harlow and she was less voluptuous than a big bad mama like Rita Hayworth; she was a leaner, tougher version of Brigitte Bardot -- a Bardot with humor and a streak of hard intelligence.

“After so much heavy political and feminist activity it must take guts for Fonda to acknowledge that earlier part of herself which she so carefully repressed. I imagine she's under a lot of pressure from all those prigs (male as well as female) who would like to see her appear only in politically correct roles, in parts that improve the "image of women. Her comeback movie, the satiric comedy Fun With Dick and Jane…, has its "serious" political side -- a rather offensively glib portrait of America as a totally corrupt society -- but that's not the basis of its appeal. Dick and Jane is an old-fashioned romantic comedy (with a perverse modern twist), and once again Jane Fonda proves herself the warmest sexual presence on the American screen….

“In the early part of the movie, as Fonda pretends in front of malicious neighbors that her collapsing life is going as well as ever, she's good at the comedy of embarrassment and petty humiliation. She's not unique here, however -- Mary Tyler Moore could do it as well. In her tight dungaree suits and I. Magnin gypsy silks (there seems to be a costume change for every scene) she's funny just to look at. Her Jane is vulgarly chic, the American bourgeoise [check spelling in Phoenix] as bitch mannequin. But when she and Segal start their crazy night-riding around Los Angeles, the brazenness of Fonda's wit begins to emerge fully. Nervous and excited after their first heist, she pulls her husband into the bathroom and chatters at him (and us) as she empties her bladder. There isn't an actress in the world who could make this so funny and unembarrassing.

“From here on out, the material is carried along by Dick and Jane's bantering love for each other, by the sexual competitiveness which, in the classic style of American movie comedy, is always the route to sexual accommodation…. [H]ere, playing against a strong actress, [Segal's] at his best doing his flustered-husband bit. Worried by the mess he's getting his wife into, he's astonished by her cool resourcefulness under fire and falls in love with her in a completely different way--she's not his helpless little pet anymore.

“…. With a decent director and better material, Fonda and Segal could become the Hepburn and Tracy of the '70s…. Fun With Dick and Jane never breaks decisively with TV cuteness. But Fonda does her best--and that remains the best there is.”

David Denby
Boston Phoenix,date ?