New York attorney plots to rid himself of his senile mother after meeting an attractive, available woman. Screenwriter Robert Klane, adapting his own novel (the kind of paperback kids would buy for the dirty parts), doesn't seem to have any knowledge of mental illness: to him, it's just an excuse for prurient comedy and scatological jokes, of which director Carl Reiner is apparently also a fan. George Segal--who, in the 1960s, starred mostly in war and espionage pictures--had by this time become one of America's greatest sad-sack comedians; his nutty reactions and batty responses rival only his mother's inscrutabilities. Segal is paired well with Trish Van Devere, and their moments of connection (though also played for laughs) are really the only sequences one can gravitate towards. Ruth Gordon, lovable as is she, is simply around too much--and more of her amounts to less. This is one of the worst-directed and edited films I have seen from so-called professionals. Promising scenes which ultimately don't play out for the full effect are then haphazardly disconnected from other moments which flail around endlessly, causing the crass, rickety movie to self-destruct long before it's actually over. *1/2 from ****