Jill Clayburgh, long overlooked for her sterling performances, gives a wonderful performance as Erica Benton, a woman whose husband suddenly leaves her after almost twenty years of marriage. Married after just graduating from Vassar (a great line about the school is not to be missed!), Erica's whole adult life has been defined as a wife. Left to fend for herself with her teenage daughter in Manhattan, Erica must come to terms with a brave new world of vastly different mores than she is accustomed to.
As Erica seeks to re-define herself as a single woman, she has some embarrassing, albeit humorous, encounters in discos and taxi cabs with men who are quite frank about their needs and desires. Confused, she turns to a therapist who helps her cope and explore the person she truly is but has never had the opportunity to express. When she is able to comes to term with this issue, Erica finds happiness with someone who is her polar opposite but who loves her for the person she is.
Throughout the film, the loving relationship between Erica and her daughter, who is also intelligent and free-thinking, is explored. Although the two spar early on in the film (Erica vents her rage over men inappropriately towards the daughter's boyfriend), one of the final scenes where the two sit and play at the piano is one of the most beautiful mother-daughter scenes in modern film.
As Erica seeks to re-define herself as a single woman, she has some embarrassing, albeit humorous, encounters in discos and taxi cabs with men who are quite frank about their needs and desires. Confused, she turns to a therapist who helps her cope and explore the person she truly is but has never had the opportunity to express. When she is able to comes to term with this issue, Erica finds happiness with someone who is her polar opposite but who loves her for the person she is.
Throughout the film, the loving relationship between Erica and her daughter, who is also intelligent and free-thinking, is explored. Although the two spar early on in the film (Erica vents her rage over men inappropriately towards the daughter's boyfriend), one of the final scenes where the two sit and play at the piano is one of the most beautiful mother-daughter scenes in modern film.