Quick Thoughts - The Odd Couple (1968)

11/21/13: What could have been a brilliant film turns into a maddeningly irritating bore. The premise of the Neil Simon scripted film, based on his play, is near-perfect in its simplicity: A messy friend shares his apartment with his obsessive-compulsive, narcissistic friend whose wife has just kicked him out. And the casting of Walter Matthau and Jack Lemmon virtually guarantees a hit. It works for a while, until it gets repetitive, acting out the same argument over and over until Lemmon overdoes it, crossing the line between providing an essential part in the dynamic between these two characters from which the humor is derived, and simply becoming grating on the nerves. **