Tonight at 8 p.m., the Dryden will screen The War of the Roses (Danny Devito, U.S. 1989, 115 min., 35mm).

Oliver (Michael Douglas) and Barbara (Kathleen Turner) Rose are a wealthy married couple, but any love they might have once felt for each other has now degenerated into bitter, mutual hatred and contempt. Their vicious divorce battle gradually turns into a matter of life in death. This incredibly black, almost gothic unromantic comedy works also as a proper cautionary tale, and a fierce attack on the shallow yuppie "values" and lifestyles that have emerged and flourished in the '80s. Michael Douglas is quietly brilliant, as usual, in this macabre twist on the chemistry he shared with Kathleen Turner in Romancing the Stone (1984) and The Jewel of the Nile (1985).

[source: Dryden website, 2015-May-4]