(1982)

Submitted by Julio M

Pooper:
Zack (Michael Ontkean) comes out to his wife Claire (Kate Jackson). They eventually divorce because he wants to stay true to himself and prefers to let her go and find someone who will make her happy. He and Bart (Harry Hamlin), however, also end their tryst because Bart prefers to stick to his carefree lifestyle, rather than admitting his newfound feelings for Zack.

Longer version:
While his wife Claire is away on a business trip imposed by her network boss, Zack spends time with Bart. By this point, Zack is all but convinced that he is sexually attracted to men and considers ending his marriage to be with Bart -he even goes as far as telling Bart “I love you”, while they’re in bed together-. However, things do not go well between them; they end up fighting over each other’s personal issues and Bart, both because he’s used to doing this and he’s afraid to try and love someone back, pushes Zack away, although he deep down ends up regretting it.

Upon Claire’s return, Zack decides to tell her about him being gay and having been with Bart, which causes a bitter separation between them. Claire finds herself wondering if she did something wrong as a wife and even gets in touch with a guy Zack picked up, earlier in the film, to see if anything happened between them and if this person was happy as an openly gay man. Later, she tries to convince Zack to stay married to her and that she’d be ok with him having gay trysts, out of fear of losing him, but he won’t have it because he feels she doesn’t deserve that lie. They agree to an amicable divorce and he moves to New York, to accept a major work promotion.

The plot, then, forwards to years later. Zack and Claire get reacquainted at the funeral of their old neighbour and friend, Winnie (Wendy Hiller). He is in a committed relationship with a male banker and she is (apparently) a housewife, remarried with a son -which she did name “Rupert”, to Zack’s surprise-. They appear to be happy to see each other and with the direction their respective lives eventually took; although, as he is seen leaving, she hints at never having fully fallen out of love with him.