Film “Couples Retreat” Critical Review a. Event Synopsis and Theme: 1. Synopsis: Give a brief synopsis of the story. What was it about? This movie was about four couples went to the resort of Eden West for their vacation. The Jason couple intended to save their marriage in crisis from taking the journey to the resort. But the rest of the three couples who were convinced by Jason couple to attend only went for having fun with the recreational programs the resort offered. Later, all four couples realized the problems in their relationship under the guide of resort therapists. After going through activities the resort provided for the purpose of promoting couple relationship and a series of events that challenge the four couples’ relationships, they finally learned how to repair their own problems that endangered their relationship by expressing their true feelings to their partners and had a happy ending completed the course of therapy in the resort of Eden. 2. Is the film based on a true story or is it fictional? This film is based on the problems married couples may face in the real life, so that audience can feel pretty resonated by the four couples’ situation presented in the film. 3. Theme: What message is the writer trying to communicate to the audience or viewer? The writer of the film intended to convey the message of the fact that passion to love can diminish for a married couple after together dealing with a series of realistic situation like house payment, taking care of children and cases that they may have started to consider their being together more like for responsibility than for the still burning love fire. But decreased love should not be ignored and should be considered by the married couple as a sign to figure out what problems that endanger their relationship and spend time together on communicating to each other heart-to-heart and conceiving plans that help arouse their consciousness to love again. b. Presentation Style: (Provide examples for all your statements/observations) 1. Did the performers utilize any special presentation style? Most of time performers in the film acted in representational style which we can tell what message they meant to deliver to audience. For example, four couples’ body language vividly depicted their different responses to resort therapists’ analysis of the potential problems they had in their relationship, such as when the David couple turned to wear an facial expression of shock when they heard the therapist pointed out the potential problems they didn’t notice before in their marriage. Likewise, the awkward way another main character Joey acted when seeing a bunch of hot girls passing by represented what we might see in the real life that’s men’s lust for new stimulant and attempt to develop a third affair outside a marriage. 2. Did any of the performers stand out? Why? Give examples. Yes. For me, Joey played ...

1. Film “Couples Retreat” Critical Review
a. Event Synopsis and Theme:
1. Synopsis: Give a brief synopsis of the story. What was it
about?
This movie was about four couples went to the resort of Eden
West for their vacation.
The Jason couple intended to save their marriage in crisis from
taking the journey to
the resort. But the rest of the three couples who were convinced
by Jason couple to
attend only went for having fun with the recreational programs
the resort offered.
Later, all four couples realized the problems in their
relationship under the guide of
resort therapists. After going through activities the resort
provided for the purpose of
promoting couple relationship and a series of events that
challenge the four couples’
relationships, they finally learned how to repair their own
problems that endangered
their relationship by expressing their true feelings to their

2. partners and had a happy
ending completed the course of therapy in the resort of Eden.
2. Is the film based on a true story or is it fictional?
This film is based on the problems married couples may face in
the real life, so that
audience can feel pretty resonated by the four couples’ situation
presented in the film.
3. Theme: What message is the writer trying to communicate to
the audience or viewer?
The writer of the film intended to convey the message of the
fact that passion to love
can diminish for a married couple after together dealing with a
series of realistic
situation like house payment, taking care of children and cases
that they may have
started to consider their being together more like for
responsibility than for the still
burning love fire. But decreased love should not be ignored and
should be considered
by the married couple as a sign to figure out what problems that
endanger their
relationship and spend time together on communicating to each

3. other heart-to-heart
and conceiving plans that help arouse their consciousness to
love again.
b. Presentation Style: (Provide examples for all your
statements/observations)
1. Did the performers utilize any special presentation style?
Most of time performers in the film acted in representational
style which we can tell
what message they meant to deliver to audience. For example,
four couples’ body
language vividly depicted their different responses to resort
therapists’ analysis of the
potential problems they had in their relationship, such as when
the David couple
turned to wear an facial expression of shock when they heard
the therapist pointed out
the potential problems they didn’t notice before in their
marriage. Likewise, the
awkward way another main character Joey acted when seeing a
bunch of hot girls
passing by represented what we might see in the real life that’s
men’s lust for new
stimulant and attempt to develop a third affair outside a
marriage.

4. 2. Did any of the performers stand out? Why? Give examples.
Yes. For me, Joey played by Jon Favreau really stood out
because his excellent
performances have done a great portrait of the character Joey
who would have been
initially remarked as a lustful mid-aged guy bored with his
monotonic marriage but
whose desire and passion to be loved and cared by his wife was
later revealed from
his enragement caused by his witness of wife’s cheating and his
intense
communication to his wife about his true feelings. For example,
the two scene that
featured his hookup with a blonde chick heading off to Eden
East resort and his
fantasy about the female massagist’s touch fully reflected his
desire to experience the
feeling of falling in love and intimating with someone he hasn’t
done with his wife
since they have became so exhausted in dealing with family
problems. Every
consequence ensues from its own cause so that the scene Joey

5. expressed his
hormone-flowing desire so explicitly in an almost exaggerating
way when he met a
new female can be explained by his strong need to arouse his
gradually chilling
passion to love in his body after being staying in marriage filled
with stuffy
atmosphere. Thus, both of his and his wife’s change gave a
warning to couples who
were satiated with their seemingly harmonious relationship that
it is the fact that love
can cool down after a period and action is necessarily to be
taken to maintain
happiness in marriage.
3. Were the performances believable and honest? Why? Provide
an example.
The performers in this film completely dedicated themselves to
constructing a
meaningful and interesting comedy for audience with their
skillful and close-to-life
acting styles so that audience were so emotionally affected by
the scenes where the
four couples explored their potential problems with each other
with the assistance of

6. therapists and started to dig themselves in a long
reconsideration of their relationship
and solutions to problems discovered. It is the fact that the
major audience for this
film in the theater were either married couples or couples in
love. The emotional part
of the film many times elicited their spontaneous reactions such
as sighing, sympathy ,
and sometimes a deep silence for the fact they were reminded of
some common
experiences as the four couples’ experiences presented by the
film. For example,
when the scene David reunited with his wife and sincerely
admitted his still deep
affection to his wife, several couples sitting near me were
physically affected by
David’s steadfast commitment to his love through lingering
their eyes on their
partners for a long time and intimated each other either by
embracing or leaning
against each other to feel their power of love.
c. Directorial Concept:

7. 1. What was the Director’s point of view in presenting this
event?
The director views the four couples presented in this film may
represent one marriage
in the real life since the couples in real life may experience
problems in combination
of what each four couples faced respectively. For example, the
jobs, wage, children
concerns the David couple had in this film described the part of
marriage life in
which a couple has to shift their time from romance to the
realistic problems they
have to get over; the Shane couple’s age gap problem also point
out the important to
consider wisely about the consequences to marry or fall in love
with younger partner;
And the Joey couple gave an alarm to those outwardly peaceful
couples that ignoring
to love as before may endanger the situation of marriage.
2. What was the promise of this production? Was it fulfilled?
This movie was created for both entertainment and enlightment
purposes. The
purpose of trying to entertain audience is revealed not only by

8. the introduction of
film’s type as comedy but by some particular ways the director
arranged, such as
David’s younger son peed in the toilet on the floor of Home
Depot and the
powerpoint presentation Jason couple utilized to explain the
reasons for their
consideration of divorce. The film’s entertainment promise is
fulfilled because I
witnessed the audience’s laugh out and chuckles in alternation
which qualifies the
film as a good comedy. On the part of enlightment, audience has
been educated about
the way they should use to fix their relationship in crisis when
the director had an
excellent job in affecting audience emotionally with the 4
couples’ transition from the
time of panic when discovering problems to the time of relief
and self-discovery for
the reunion with their partners and the communications with
which each couple
expressed their true feelings and intentions to recover their
relationship. Therefore,

9. the purpose of enlightment is also fulfilled in this film.
3. What would you have done to improve the event?
If I was the director, I would give more main characters comedy
part. Because the
eight main characters play the central role in creating a quality
film, and the type of
the film is labeled comedy, the eight characters could develop
more on their comedy
part since the audience indeed raised a doubt about the
qualification for this movie to
be classified as a comedy when they barely saw the four couples
developed their
humors. For example, the scene about their awkward gesture
when being forced to
undress showed that they acted kind of rigidly at that current
time and forgot the
importance to ease up and use the opportunity of the scene
regarded as one of a few
comedy parts in this film to give the audience a sense of humor.
d. Use of Lighting:
1. How was the lighting used within the film or play?
The lighting use in this film was based on different scenes or

10. contents. When the
scenes about couples discussing their realistic problems, the
movie screen looked
darker causing audience to sympathize with the experiences
characters had. But when
the it shifted to the beautiful views of resort of Eden West, the
bright and refreshing
light was used to visually appeal audience with fancy and
palace-like resort
environment.
2. What if anything was unusual about the utilization of light or
environment?
There is one particular scene that utilized the unusual light to
decorate the resort of
Eden East in contrast to the breezy and natural light used for the
resort of Eden West
because the director intended to use Eden East as a symbol of
lust and indulgence
youths will pursue and a symbol of temptations that challenge
the faith of married
couples.
3. Any special use of color?

11. Just as the striking, glaring light is taken as an important tool to
depict the resort of
Eden East as a place full of temptations, the vivid, colorful
dancing floor, decorations
of the Eden East and hot energetic young men and women in
colorful costumes were
taken important detail to give audience a sense of caution about
the outwardly
luxurious and escatasic Eden East.
e. Overall Even Design:
1. Was it the best format to convey the story or idea? Why?
Yes. Film is best format to convey this story because a good
story is based on the
combination of different elements such as actors’ acting
techniques, sound effects,
lighting, environment and other detailed handling.If that was a
play to convey this
story, the actors’ performances may be limited by the stage and
some environment
depiction may lack or not give the same effects the film can
create with cameras that
give different point of views which refines the presentation with
more detail, more

12. description, and more points audience may not see clearly from
a two-dimensional
stage play.
2. What influence did special effects, music, make up,
staging/scenery, costumes, have
on the general feeling of the work?
This film discussed and described the serious topic of marriage
problems in a relaxing
atmosphere instead of a stuffy way by choosing the beautiful,
soothing resort of Eden
as the spot for the expansion of the story, so that the light,
breezy music of nature
was played every time when the film moved to the scenery of
resort of Eden, and the
environment outside and inside the resort were also embellished
to create visual
appeals to audience. For example, guests in the resort of Eden
West all wore colorful
costumes matching with natural landscapes around the resort,
which made audience
enjoy the movie with very comfortable feelings.

13. 3. What influence did the facility, geographic neighborhood,
parking, event staff have
on the general feeling of what you experienced?
The space in which I watched this movie was in a dark room
furnished with only
three or four dim light on the side and seated the audience who
appeared mostly in
couple. The condition of this environment enabled the audience
to concentrate more
and enjoyed the excellent sound effects and appealing colors
and scenes presented in
the movie.
f. Most memorable moment:
1. What moment of the event impressed you the most?
The moment that impressed me the most was the part of movie
in which the four
couples turned to be concerned about their marriage with the
assistance of resort
therapists from their initially relaxed and elated mood to have
fun journey together. It
is not hard to see that the director tried to use a twist to give
couples warning that they

14. should reexamine their marriage life for potential problems and
take effective actions
to fix the relationship in crisis.
2. Which specific elements were responsible for this affecting
moment?
The moment that caused me and the audience to be emotionally
affected started with
a peaceful beginning that the four couples’ initially no concerns
about their seemingly
sound relationship, and later gave a shot of enlightment that the
problems not found
yet doesn’t mean no problems at all when the four couples’
apprehensions increased
as the therapists explicitly pointed out their problems.
3. How did you or the audience express its approval/disapproval
of the aspect?
At the beginning, the audience and me had the similar response
as the four couples’
shocking response when hearing their own problems. Later, we
sympathized by
sighing a lot to approve the fact that every couple may have
their own problems, and
a couple even sat closer to each other and held hands tightly as

15. if they will cherish
each other more and figure out solutions right away to solve
potential problems.
g. Audience/Personal Response:
1. Did the event or work of art hold your or the audience’s
attention throughout?
Yes. This film completely held my and the audience’s attention
throughout because
both of us were either emotionally affected by laugh out and
sympathized with
characters or physically affected by shaking our body slightly
when the music of
nature started to play.
2. What type of audience was the event or work of art geared to
appeal to?
This film suits couples or people older than eighteen years old
because it did a great
job on giving entertainment (though some scenes involved a
little sexual suggestions)
and teaching useful lessons to couples in relationship in a very
relaxed atmosphere.
3. Would you recommend the event? To whom and why?

16. I would definitely recommend this film to my friends older than
eighteen years old
and married couples because this film combined light comedy,
beautiful landscapes
which entertained the audience a lot with depiction of realistic
marriage problems,
weakness of human beings, and faith and commitment of
married couples that
involved the topic of ethics. All in all, this movie can be rated
as a four star film after
the general consideration of dedicated acting skills, good sound
effects, good theme
of marriage problems worthwhile pondering and other detailed
ornament the film
utilized.