Erica Benton (Jill Clayburgh) has a happy life with her husband Martin (Michael Murphy) and teenage daughter Patti in Manhattan. Despite a few issues bubbling in their marriage, Erica is completely surprised by a tearful Martin confessing his year long extramarital affair. They separate. She struggles with her new life. Marriage is becoming an endangered species.

This is a great look into the new world of the American marriage. Kramer vs. Kramer would come a year later. This one looks at it from the wife's point of view despite being written and directed by a man. Paul Mazursky is able to give Erica a convincing female voice. It all boils down to Jill Clayburgh's performance. She gives the character a reality. I like her development, her relationships, and her struggles. I would do one thing. I would reverse the order between Saul and Martin. I would end the movie with her most important relationship with Patti. After a fight with Saul, Martin could then beg to return while having dinner with both Erica and Patti. That would be a brutal scene and an amazing possibility. The large painting is very cute and it's perfectly nice to end the movie on a cute note. The movie could have pushed harder for a more explosive climax.

A wealthy woman from Manhattan's Upper East Side struggles to deal with her new identity and her sexuality after her husband of 16 years leaves her for a younger woman.

Maybe I live in the wrong era, but this film struck me as so bizarre. I can understand going through a shocking transition when divorce comes at you out of nowhere. That part of the film was handled very well, even if a bit over the top.

What I did not understand was the film's obsession with sex. At one point the woman comments that she had not had sex in seven weeks and thought her world was falling apart. Some of the happiest couples go years... if you are measuring your happiness in sexual encounters, I do not think you fully understand what it means to love someone.

An acting triumph for Jill Clayburgh, playing a N.Y.C. wife and mother whose husband tells her he's fallen in love with another woman. Brittle, biting, funny, and moving; a serious-comedy that benefits from a screenplay which is sometimes strangely over-the-top and yet nearly always on-track emotionally. In his determination to find The Truth about the American woman in the 1970s, writer-director Paul Mazursky gets a little kooky: Clayburgh's Erica throws up on the street after her husband confesses his affair; she later fends off the affections of both her doctor and a blind date (one of those guys who tries covering his bald scalp with overlong side hairs). She's also in therapy and her doctor turns out to be a lesbian (and we never see Erica in therapy again). The mother-daughter dynamics between Clayburgh and tough little nut Lisa Lucas are precise and believable; when Mom brings a man over for dinner, daughter feels defensive and gets mouthy. But the night ends playfully, with the ladies playing piano together and bonding over Paul McCartney! Alan Bates enters in the second-act as a burly, not-pushy artist who falls for Erica, yet she's not so sure. Why she's so reluctant to throw down her defenses for this man isn't made quite clear (playful, sexy Bates would be a godsend to any unattached woman). The film isn't necessarily logical, though it takes pride in being flaky and tart. There are big, passionate feelings in "An Unmarried Woman" and, instead of being some kind of emotional workout, it is surprisingly romantic (which ticked some feminists off, who wanted more than lightweight laughs). I enjoyed it, although it probably seems dated by today's standards. It certainly is peculiar, with Mazursky's penchant for outrageous dialogue punctuated by genuinely affecting emotions. *** from ****