The Mirror Has Two Faces (1996) Review

Rose and Gregory both work at Colombia University but had never met. That was until Rose’s sister replied to a personal ad Gregory had put in the paper, he had a theory that sex was spoiling his life and a marriage would work much better without it.

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Rose is pretty much sick of her life as well after her sister marries the man she has always been totally in love with. Both looking for a companion but maybe for slightly different reasons. Neither of them want to be alone, but agree that the whole love and sex thing is not something they are going to have in their relationship. They will be friends, listen to each other and well just care.

Obviously as the viewer you can see what is going to happen and how everything is going to end up, but that does not stop the film from being very entertaining with lovely performances from Jeff Bridges and Barbra Streisand who really form such a great relationship. Lauren Bacall is very impressive in the role of Rose’s mother as well such a commanding performance, would you expect anything less from her?

Would it actually be possible to marry someone and not have any physical attraction and/or lust towards them? Would that actually develop over time as you find yourself still falling in love with the person? These are all things that this film really links into and finds itself exploring the range of emotions.

The final third of the film does take a pretty sad turn when Rose thinks that the way she looks is the reason for the rejection and not being able to have a normal relationship or marriage. Changing her whole lifestyle, a diet, hair, make up and getting fit. Something which I found pretty heartbreaking in all honesty as you never want any of those things to be done for or because of another person being so cruel. You want that to be done for the person themselves, while I am sure that is the case for Rose but it was triggered in such a sad nasty way.

It does have a nice ending though and you are really behind Rose for not stepping down and eventually standing up for herself and what she really does want. Especially when people seem to be changing the way they treat her because she changed the way she looked, or should that be more started to care about the way she looked.

I would certainly say this is a nice film that could be considered a Netflix hidden gem, as I had never heard of the film before watching it last night. If you are into this genre it should be a film you check out. I was pleased to watch it, light enough and very easy to watch at times. Sometimes you just need films like that!