The structure doesn’t work and the characters feel like screenplay concoctions (despite being drawn from a Larry McMurtry novel), but that hardly matters considering the three performances at the center of Terms of Endearment. The strongest turn comes from the one actor who didn’t win an Oscar: Debra Winger as Emma Greenway, a young wife and mother juggling her increasingly shifty, academic husband (Jeff Daniels) and her imposing, overbearing mother (Shirley MacLaine). Winger gives us someone incredibly unique and specific, making Emma carefree, agreeable, and even goofy without sacrificing an incredibly strong sense of self. (After a particularly sassy remark from her oldest son, she cheerily tells him, “You’re allowed to say one mean thing to me a year.”) Of course, Winger was always going to lose the Best Actress award to MacLaine, who is excellent. As Aurora Greenway, she leavens the oppressiveness of the character with little bits of comedy (notice her handling of garden shears in one conversation), while also letting us see Aurora’s vulnerability and resilience. And the scenes between her and Jack Nicholson—who won Best Supporting Actor as Garrett Breedlove, a former astronaut and Aurora’s neighbor—are electric. These are two icons going toe to toe as characters and performers; they’ve both experienced too much of life to be anything but brutally honest. In addition to the acting accolades, Terms of Endearment also won Best Picture, as well as Best Director and Best Adapted Screenplay for James L. Brooks (Broadcast News, Spanglish).
(7/25/2025)
