Only the Lonely

Writer-director Chris Columbus mines Paddy Chaveysky's Marty for this bittersweet comedy about a lonely 38-year old Chicago cop dominated by his harridan mother. Danny Muldoon (John Candy), in spite of being well known and well liked in his neighborhood, still lives at home with his mother Rose ...more

Chris Columbus' Only the Lonely is memorable if for no other reason than it attempts to make John Candy into a viable romantic lead. He does not have conventional sex appeal, but Candy does communicate a basic goodness and kindness as Danny Muldoon that helps make this familiar story more palatable than one might expect. The relationship between Danny and his mother could easily devolve into bathos in the hands of lazy actors, but Candy and Maureen O'Hara pull it off. They are familiar "types" ...more