Sweet Hearts Dance is a 1988

1988 in film

-Top grossing films :- Awards :Academy Awards:* Act of Piracy* Action Jackson, starring Carl Weathers, Craig T. Nelson, Vanity, Sharon Stone* The Adventures of Baron Munchausen* Akira* Alice...

 American

Cinema of the United States

The cinema of the United States, also known as Hollywood, has had a profound effect on cinema across the world since the early 20th century. Its history is sometimes separated into four main periods: the silent film era, classical Hollywood cinema, New Hollywood, and the contemporary period...

 comedy drama film directed by Robert Greenwald

Robert Greenwald

Robert Greenwald is an American film director, film producer, and political activist.-Early life:Greenwald was born and raised in New York City, the son of Ruth and Harold Greenwald. He attended the city's High School of Performing Arts...

. The screenplay by Ernest Thompson centers on two small town couples, one married for several years and the other at the beginning of their relationship.

The film was shot on location in Hyde Park, Vermont

Hyde Park, Vermont

Hyde Park, Vermont may refer to:* Hyde Park , Vermont* Hyde Park , Vermont...

.

Plot

It's Halloween

Halloween

Hallowe'en , also known as Halloween or All Hallows' Eve, is a yearly holiday observed around the world on October 31, the night before All Saints' Day...

, and New England

New England

New England is a region in the northeastern corner of the United States consisting of the six states of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut...

 contractor Wiley Boon, married to his high school sweetheart Sandra and the father of three children, feels smothered after fifteen years of the same routine and is facing a midlife crisis

Midlife Crisis

"Midlife Crisis" is a song by the American rock band Faith No More. It was released on May 26, 1992 as the first single from their fourth album, Angel Dust...

. His best friend, local school board president Sam Manners, is on the verge of starting a relationship with Adie Nims, a recent transplant from Florida

Florida

Florida is a state in the southeastern United States, located on the nation's Atlantic and Gulf coasts. It is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the north by Alabama and Georgia and to the east by the Atlantic Ocean. With a population of 18,801,310 as measured by the 2010 census, it...

 and the new teacher at the grade school. During Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving (United States)

Thanksgiving, or Thanksgiving Day, is a holiday celebrated in the United States on the fourth Thursday in November. It has officially been an annual tradition since 1863, when, during the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln proclaimed a national day of thanksgiving to be celebrated on Thursday,...

 dinner, Wiley and Sandra have a minor disagreement that prompts him to leave his family and move into a mobile home to sort through his feelings of emotional unrest. Using subsequent holidays as a background, the film focuses on both their efforts to recapture the magic of their early years together.

Cast

• Don Johnson
  Don Johnson
  Donnie Wayne "Don" Johnson is an American actor known for his work in television and film. He played the lead role of James "Sonny" Crockett in the 1980s TV cop series, Miami Vice, which led him to huge success. He also played the lead role in the 1990s cop series, Nash Bridges...
  
   ..... Wiley Boon
• Susan Sarandon
  Susan Sarandon
  Susan Sarandon is an American actress. She has worked in films and television since 1969, and won an Academy Award for Best Actress for her performance in the 1995 film Dead Man Walking. She had also been nominated for the award for four films before that and has received other recognition for her...
  
   ..... Sandra Boon
• Jeff Daniels
  Jeff Daniels
  Jeffrey Warren "Jeff" Daniels is an American actor, musician and playwright. He founded a non-profit theatre company, the Purple Rose Theatre Company, in his home state of Michigan...
  
   ..... Sam Manners
• Elizabeth Perkins
  Elizabeth Perkins
  Elizabeth Ann Perkins is an American actress. Her film roles have included Big, The Flintstones, Miracle on 34th Street, About Last Night..., and Avalon...
  
   ..... Adie Nims
• Kate Reid
  Kate Reid
  Kate Reid, OC was a Canadian stage, film and television actress.-Life and career:Daphne Kate Reid was born in London, England, the daughter of Canadian parents, Helen Isabel and Walter Clarke Reid, who was a former Bengal Lancer in the Indian army and a retired colonel...
  
   ..... Pearne Manners
• Justin Henry
  Justin Henry
  Justin Henry is a former child actor, who since 2000 has been a new media business professional. He appeared in the 1979 film Kramer vs. Kramer, his first role, in a performance that earned him a nomination for Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor, the youngest actor to ever be nominated in any...
  
   ..... Kyle Boon
• Holly Marie Combs
  Holly Marie Combs
  Holly Marie Combs is an American film and television actress and producer whose roles have included a portrayal in Charmed as Piper Halliwell and another in Picket Fences, where she received a Young Artist Award for her role, as Kimberly Brock...
  
   ..... Debs Boon
• Lawrence Olivier ..... Dan Norton

Critical reception

Janet Maslin

Janet Maslin

Janet Maslin is an American journalist, best known as a film and literary critic for The New York Times. She served as the Times film critic from 1977–1999.- Biography :...

 of the New York Times thought "the rapport between the film's four principals is so well established that its romantic quadrille about the various ups and downs of two humorously contrasting couples really does come to life." She added, "Sweet Hearts Dance . . . approaches love as a series of fits and starts. It approaches narrative in much the same way, which would be more of a problem if the film were not so enjoyably loose-jointed anyhow . . . [It] tends to drift, but it has good humor and an easygoing appeal, not to mention a thoroughly attractive cast."

Roger Ebert

Roger Ebert

Roger Joseph Ebert is an American film critic and screenwriter. He is the first film critic to win a Pulitzer Prize for Criticism.Ebert is known for his film review column and for the television programs Sneak Previews, At the Movies with Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert, and Siskel and Ebert and The...

 of the Chicago Sun-Times

Chicago Sun-Times

The Chicago Sun-Times is an American daily newspaper published in Chicago, Illinois. It is the flagship paper of the Sun-Times Media Group.-History:The Chicago Sun-Times is the oldest continuously published daily newspaper in the city...

rated the film two out of four stars. He felt the screenplay "seems to meander in whatever direction the filmmakers thought they could find an inspiration" but added, "And yet the film is not without merit. All of the performances are interesting, and although I was not surprised that three of the four leads were good, I was surprised at how effective Don Johnson was in his role. It's the best thing he's done, and shows he can do good things." He concluded, "There were times when I thought I'd seen this movie before - maybe in The Four Seasons

The Four Seasons (film)

The Four Seasons is a 1981 romantic comedy film starring Alan Alda, Carol Burnett, Len Cariou, Sandy Dennis, Rita Moreno, Jack Weston and Bess Armstrong.-Plot summary:...

by Alan Alda

Alan Alda

Alphonso Joseph D'Abruzzo , better known as Alan Alda, is an American actor, director, screenwriter, and author. A six-time Emmy Award and Golden Globe Award winner, he is best known for his role as Hawkeye Pierce in the TV series M*A*S*H...

 or, for that matter, in any film by Alda. Made by sensitive, sophisticated middle-age men about sensitive middle-age men who are a little less sophisticated, the movie drips with nostalgia

Nostalgia

The term nostalgia describes a yearning for the past, often in idealized form.The word is a learned formation of a Greek compound, consisting of , meaning "returning home", a Homeric word, and , meaning "pain, ache"...

, but sometimes what everybody seems to want isn't love, but a gift certificate at L.L. Bean. The lifestyle itself threatens to upstage the drama, and as the wholesome New Englanders go about their wholesome New England pastimes, even suffering begins to look picturesque."

Rita Kempley of the Washington Post described the film as "thirtysomething in needlepoint

Needlepoint

Needlepoint is a form of counted thread embroidery in which yarn is stitched through a stiff open weave canvas. Most needlepoint designs completely cover the canvas...

" and commented, "With its comfortable characters and small-town setting, it's as homey as hash - almost as if the director just threw it together like a housewife with unexpected company. It's not a grand movie, but an enjoyable midlife comedy that features Don Johnson in a breakthrough performance. Also, it was amazing to see Sir Laurence Olivier to play Dan Norton from the grave."