AllMovie

With her wickedly funny adaptation of Postcards from the Edge from her own semi-autobiographical novel, Carrie Fisher proved that she was more than an actress most famous for battling space thugs in a chain-mail bikini. And with her performance in Postcards from the Edge, Meryl Streep proved herself exquisitely capable of all-out comic work, imbuing her character with dry wit and caustic insecurity. Although Postcards is perhaps most memorable for both Fisher's and Streep's work, it is also a successfully realized comedy-satire that functions as both a comedy about mother-daughter relationships and a satire of Hollywood in all its dysfunctional glory. Director Mike Nichols staged one of the decade's best casting coups, starring Shirley MacLaine and Streep opposite each other as the constantly bickering but ultimately caring mother and daughter, loosely based on Fisher and her own mother, Debbie Reynolds. Saved from brattiness by Fisher's intelligence and humor, Postcards is whip-smart fun, causing as many gasps as laughs.