An enjoyable jet back comedy and one of Burt Reynolds best directorial efforts, THE END will make you laugh pretty hard while occasionally tugging at your emotions.
Reynolds stars as Sonny Lawson, who finds out he has a blood disease during a hilarious opening scene that Reynolds and Normal Fell (as a doctor with very little bedside manner) play to perfection.
Sonny decides to visit each of the important people in his life before committing suicide to avoid pain (he is NOT big on pain of any kind).
He visits his aging parents, hilariously played by Myrna Loy and Pat O'Brian, Sally Field in an unexpectedly sexy turn as his girlfriend (who knew?) Kristy McNichol as his daughter in the film's only bad performance and Joanne Woodward as his beautiful ex-wife.
Once that's done, Reynolds decides to commit suicide but fails, ending up in a mental institution with the absolutely hilarious Dom DeLuise. This was their first co-starring film after the silent Mel Brooks film, Silent Movie, and they are very, very funny. DeLuise has never been better and his split personality one-liners are rapid fire and mostly on target.
It's dark, a little dated, and much better than you might expect. There was a reason Burt was the biggest box office star of the seventies and while this wasn't his typical film or his biggest hit, in THE END, it's a pretty clever comedy of the darkest shade that earns a solid B.
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