Once in a lifetime comes a motion picture that makes you feel like falling in love all over again. This is not that movie.

Divorce lawyer Danny De Vito warns his prospective client that the story he's about to tell isn't a pretty one, but the client listens with eager intensity -- as do the folks out there in the movie in the audience. The War of the Roses can best be described as a slapstick tragedy concerning the decline and literal fall of a marriage. After 17 years, Oliver (Michael Douglas) and Barbara (Kathleen Turner) Rose want a divorce. Not for this couple is there anything resembling a "civilized understanding": Barbara wants their opulent house, and Oliver isn't about to part with the domicile. Barbara nails the basement door shut while Oliver is downstairs, Oliver disrupts Barbara's fancy party by taking aim at the catered dinner, Barbara lays waste to Oliver's sports car....and so it goes, culminating in a disastrous showdown around, about and under the living room's fancy chandelier. DeVito and screenwriter Michael Leeson never let us forget that the couple's self-indulgent imbroglio exacts an awful price upon their children (Sean Astin and Heather Fairfield). The War of the Roses was adapted from the novel by Warren Adler.

The War of the Roses is a 1989 American black comedy film based upon the 1981 novel The War of the Roses by Warren Adler. The film follows a wealthy couple with a seemingly perfect marriage. When their marriage begins to fall apart, material possessions become the center of an outrageous and bitter divorce battle.
This is the third film to co-star Michael Douglas, Kathleen Turner, and Danny DeVito, after Romancing the Stone and its sequel, The Jewel of the Nile. DeVito directed the film, which also had producer James L. Brooks and actor Dan Castellaneta working on a project outside of The Simpsons. The opening title sequence was created by Saul Bass.
In both the novel and the film, the married couple's family name is Rose, and the title is an allusion to the battles between the Houses of York and Lancaster at the end of the Middle Ages.

pon its release, the film was a success with critics and a box office hit, bringing in $83.7 million domestically in U.S. box office receipts, and $160,188,546 worldwide.[2]
The film maintains a positive 81% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.[3]
As a guest on Rachael Ray on March 15, 2010, Catherine Zeta-Jones stated that she would like to co-star with her husband, Michael Douglas, in a remake of the film

Release Date: December 8, 1989


Distrib: 20th Century Fox


Boxoffice: $86,888,546 2014: $175,830,700