Maria's Lovers casts Natassia Kinski and John Savage as a pair of young Slavic second generation Americans in Western Pennsylvania who get married after World War II and presumably like most will live the American dream happily ever after.
Not quite so happily though because Savage has some real issues and who wouldn't after surviving a Japanese prison camp. In fact his well meaning but quite fatuous father Robert Mitchum asks Savage why didn't he try and escape. This was obviously a man who had seen too many American gangster flicks where Cagney/Bogart/Raft are always crashing out of the big house.
Mitchum is fatuous about that, but he does say to Savage not to rush into things. As well he shouldn't with his issues. Wedding night comes and he can't do the deed.
Which leaves Kinski looking for a little love in all the wrong places. And charming itinerant entertainer Keith Carradine picks up on it.
The issue of impotence and its infinite number of causes was dealt with a lot better in the British classic film, The Family Way. It's not as simple as it is made out here where Savage's very manhood is called into question and it's a do or divorce situation.
Best in the film is Keith Carradine who is really quite amoral. Makes his character from Nashville look like an Eagle Scout. And of course Robert Mitchum always adds something to any film he's in.
I have to say though I was left as unfulfilled as Natassia on her wedding night.
