Budget 👏 Neil Simon’s The Odd Couple 2 DVD – Mary Beth Peil, Walter Matthau 🧨

Sequels might be the lifeblood of mainstream Hollywood film production but it took 30 years for The Odd Couple 2 to reunite Jack Lemmon, Walter Matthau and writer Neil Simon for a follow-up to their scintillating 1967 success. Now Felix (Lemmon) and Oscar (Matthau), once mismatched flatmates, are forced to renew their old friendship when their respective children get married. Cue all the ingredients for a disaster-riddled journey to California for the wedding: lost luggage, allergies, dangerously wanton women (and their husbands), illegal immigrants and repeat visits to the same police station. All the old irritations rise quickly to the surface, Simon’s dialogue is as sharp as ever and the vocal sparring skills of these two magnificent comedy players are undiminished, though there’s a certain poignancy in their physical frailty: “I’m too old to hit but I could spit you to death”, threatens Matthau at one point. Crumpled and puffy, neither of them looks in great shape. But the film gives a neat symmetry to two of the finest cinematic careers. As Matthau says towards the end, it’s “the biggest goddamndest déjà vu anyone’s ever had”. On the DVD: The Odd Couple 2 on disc has no extras apart from the original theatrical trailer. The film is presented in 2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen with a Dolby Digital Surround soundtrack. It looks and sounds good. Alan Silvestri’s score borrows the Neal Hefti theme from the 1967 original from time to time. –Piers Ford