Scent of a Woman

Charlie Simms is a student at a private preparatory school who comes from a poor family. To earn the money for his flight home to Gresham, Oregon for Christmas, Charlie takes a job over Thanksgiving looking after retired U.S. Army officer Lieutenant Colonel Frank Slade, a cantankerous middle-aged man who lives with his niece and her family.

Pacino's performance is the engine that drives almost all the goodwill here — broad, theatrical, and finally Oscar-winning — but critics were split on whether the film around him earns its considerable runtime. The audience has been far kinder than reviewers, who landed somewhere in the middle on whether the drama itself holds up.