This movie was a winner! Jack Lemmon - -who has yet to disappoint me - outdoes himself here, torn between wanting to fess up to the truth for his new friend whom he wants to help and sticking to the lie for his ex-wife whom he wants back.
Walter Matthau is fantastic as his less-than-scrupulous lawyer brother-in-law, who convinces him to use an old injury as the ticket to a fortune. After all, what's a little insurance fraud if you end up a rich guy? And if the career of football star "Boom Boom" Jackson (Ron Rich, who plays the part of the guilt-ridden nice guy whose life begins to unravel to such perfection you start to think it's real) is destroyed in the process, well, what can you do?
Judi West does a good job, too as the conniving ex-wife who returns to help the man she still loves to recover, repentant, remorseful, and hoping for a second chance. That insurance payoff has nothing to do with it, of course, and the fact that she needs money to jumpstart her singing career, a mere coincidence!
Once again, we have a movie with familiar TV faces, like Ned Glass, Howard McNear (a.k.a. Floyd on "The Andy Griffith Show"), Marge Redmond (Sister Jacqueline of "The Flying Nun"), and William Christopher (Father Mulcahy on "M*A*S*H*"). Always nice to see some old friends!
Remember that fortune in the cookie: "You can fool some of the people most of the time, and most of the people some of the time, but you can't fool all of the people all of the time!"
Walter Matthau is fantastic as his less-than-scrupulous lawyer brother-in-law, who convinces him to use an old injury as the ticket to a fortune. After all, what's a little insurance fraud if you end up a rich guy? And if the career of football star "Boom Boom" Jackson (Ron Rich, who plays the part of the guilt-ridden nice guy whose life begins to unravel to such perfection you start to think it's real) is destroyed in the process, well, what can you do?
Judi West does a good job, too as the conniving ex-wife who returns to help the man she still loves to recover, repentant, remorseful, and hoping for a second chance. That insurance payoff has nothing to do with it, of course, and the fact that she needs money to jumpstart her singing career, a mere coincidence!
Once again, we have a movie with familiar TV faces, like Ned Glass, Howard McNear (a.k.a. Floyd on "The Andy Griffith Show"), Marge Redmond (Sister Jacqueline of "The Flying Nun"), and William Christopher (Father Mulcahy on "M*A*S*H*"). Always nice to see some old friends!
Remember that fortune in the cookie: "You can fool some of the people most of the time, and most of the people some of the time, but you can't fool all of the people all of the time!"