Moment by Moment (1978)

everything you have heard about this movie is true.

Good films always raise compelling questions, whether the format is fiction or documentary fact.

The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

I found this to be a particularly outstanding 1970's romantic comedy with two of America's favorite and most versatile performers of that era, Lilly Tomlin and John Travolta. Tomlin takes a somewhat dramatic turn as she portrays the aging divorcée looking for more out of her dull life, while Travolta delivers a stellar performance as the hunky drifter looking to find true love. I was often touched by the realism of the dialogue as well as the pure heat emanating from the screen during the romantic scenes. While it is easy for a film depicting such passion to cross the line into more tawdry territory, Moment by Moment keeps it tasteful with pure Love present in each tender scene between Travolta and Tomlin. This is truly a lost gem of romantic cinema. A crowd pleasing film on all fronts and a classic that easily gains a perfect 10! Great job!

if you like comedies, romantic comedies, or romances raise your hand? if you raised your hand your in for a ride. This little treat features great pacing and classic lines that could only come from such a platonic relationship both john travolta and lily tomlin could deliver. The infamous hot tub scene almost rivals the emotional weight such scenes as marlon brando's last scene in apocalypse now does with it's subtle line delivery. I think what makes this film great is that they put the characters in situations we all can relate to. Travolta's character almost reminds me of a older Holden Caulfield type. I came for the travolta, but stayed for the tomlin.

It has been years since I have seen this film and thanks to IMDb.com and Hulu I have seen Moment By Moment (1978) again. It is currently not available on VHS nor DVD.I like the film because of the good performance of Lily Tomlin and John Travolta. They had good film chemistry together. Okay, before you bite my head off, let me explain. We know a little bit of Lily Tomlin's personal life and we know about John Travolta and some people might be judgmental about this film, but look at it this way, Lily Tomlin played her character believable and John Travolta's character was that of an insecure, sensitive young man who was down and out and needed someone to give him a lifeline. John Travolta played his role believable as well. Despite the bad dialogue that was written in this film, the two professional actors held the film together. If you watch closely, Travolta was being very respectful to Tomlin during the love scenes.I do like this film and I would buy it on DVD if it ever became available.Spoiler: I wish the film would have made an additional ending of the two back at the beach house together instead of how it did end.As many acting projects as these two big stars have done over the years and are still actively acting, I'm surprised John Travolta and Lily Tomlin haven't appeared in a film together again.

**SOME SPOILERS** Bored with life and not wanting to face her friends in any of the big parties and artistic social gatherings that she's used to attending Malibu socialite Trish Rawlings,Lily Tomlin, has opted to down bottle after bottle of pills to put her in a state of perpetual suspended animation. While under the influence Trish sleeps it off while a nasty divorce is finalized with her carousing and cheating husband Stu,Bert Kramer.Going to the drugstore for a new bottle of pills Trish is told by the druggist that she can't have them unless her previous prescription bottle is used up. While Trish is at the counter this local hustler and part time drug pusher Strip Harrison, John Travolta, pops in looking for his good and close friend Craig who works at the pharmacy. Strip finds out that he's been busted by the police the day before for stealing drugs from the store room.A shocked Strip then for some strange reason takes an immediate liking to the middle-age Trish offering to give her free of charge some pills that she was refused. It's then, like a man helplessly under some kind of hypnotic spell, for what seems like like days Strip follows and hounds her day and night in and around her beach-front estate until she finally gives in. Trish ends up giving the hungry and overbearing nudnick a piece of fried chicken to quench his appetite and a towel to dry himself off from a cold dip he took in the Pacific Ocean.Trish being all by herself and feeling that she needs someone to do some handy work around the beach house allows Strip to do part-time work for her. Soon the two begin to fit so well together, even though Trish is some fifteen years older Strip, that they shack up and before you know it start to have a hot and heavy sexual relationship.Strip goes through a number of violent and sudden emotional changes in his affair with Trish who's become very friendly with him that has her at times feel that if she as much as innocently says something that's not to his liking he'll explode and leave her forever! In fact it was actually something that Strip's parents didn't say to him that had a very depressed and heart-broken Strip run away from home. This happens a number of times in the movie that shows that Trish, despite all her hang-ups, is by far the more stable of the two. Later Strip storms out of the beach-house over such menial things like him being embarrassed when Trish had a friend Naomi, Andra Akers, over for drinks. Strip unexpectedly showing up with the groceries has Trish tell Naomi, not wanting her to know that Strip is living with her, that he's the delivery boy! This has a hurt and confused Strip angrily reject a tip which she gave him. Hurt and humiliated by Trish making him look like her houseboy not lover Strip stormed out of the house having, a now repentant, Thrish as well as Naomi scour the sleazy L.A red light district trying to get him to change his mind and come back before he ended up getting killed or killing himself. Strip who had earlier found out that Craig have died of a drug overdose, which he felt was really murder,again comes back to Trish and after making up the two become more and more of an item, in the minds of many Malibu residents. It's later when Trish and Strip go to this big party for a local art photographer where Trish's estranged husband Stu shows up together with his ex-girlfriend Stacie (Debera Feuer) the women who's responsible for her and Stu's breakup. Stacie's now new boyfriend mob drug kingpin Dan Santini, James Luisi, is who Strip believes is the person who had his friend Craig murdered. All this is just too much the for poor and emotionally drained Strip who loses his cool and again storms out of the art exhibit leaving Trish looking like a fool in front of all her socialite friends. Including her estranged husband Stu who up to that time felt that he was the only one doing any cheating. Just when Trish feels that she'll have to finally make a break with the very emotional and unstable Strip a number of unrelated incidents happen that in the end brings the two together in of all places the deceased Craig's home! It's there where Strip, with the acceptance of Craig's parents, was living after he checked out. Strip now throws away all the imaginary roadblocks that kept them apart all this time and finally get it on as equals in the romance department. Believe it or not what turned out to be the two magic words that finally broke the ice between them was "Happy Birthday" which Trish unlike Strips parents remembered.