Unholy Wedlock: Marriage and Divorce Hollywood Style

Hollywood may be more famous for its divorces than its weddings, but few subjects have sparked as entertaining, insightful and funny movies as Hollywood’s take on marriage.

In this course, we analyze how even the most entertaining films can deliver devastating insights into the trials and tribulations of marriage.

From the prim 18-year-old Elizabeth Taylor in her wedding dress as the bride in Father of the Bride (1950)—to the very same actress as the venom-spewing spouse of Richard Burton in the train-wreck marriage of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolfe (1966).

From Adam’s Rib (1949), in which a marriage is put to the ultimate test as husband (Spencer Tracy) is pitted against wife (Katherine Hepburn) on opposite sides in a murder trial—to The Women (1939), in which Joan Crawford is the ultimate home-wrecker and Norma Shearer, Joan Fontaine, and Rosalind Russell flee to Nevada to get "Reno-vated" with quickie divorces.

And finally, the divorce fireworks of Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner in War of the Roses (1989), in which material possessions become the center of an outrageous and bitter divorce.