The Incredible Shrinking Woman

One more high-promise comedy down the drainpipe: The Incredible Shrinking Woman still sounds better on paper after you've seen it. The theme should be watertight in the Nine to Five, would-be progressive mould: Woman suffering (literal) diminution under the weight of patriarchal, consumerist culture; while the advance prospect of seeing Lily Tomlin biting ankles is tasty enough to quell doubts about the wisdom of tampering with Richard Matheson's original sci-fi premise. But good intentions and one's own goodwill are soon diminished as script and direction conspire to render a sitcom satire that's indistinguishable from its target. A cloying cuteness soon pervades as Tomlin, shrinking after being sprayed with a new perfume marketed by her advertising executive husband, becomes a media celebrity; and the conclusion - curse becomes cure - is recuperative in more ways than one.