Was this a Sharon Stone film? Or was Miramax angling from the start to throw an Oscar-worthy contender into the role of the mother and market the film as a best-supporting-actress vehicle? It's only too bad that all the other supporting characters, played to perfection by James Gandolfini, Jillian Anderson, Harry Dean Stanton, and most especially Gena Rowlands, were simply not fleshed out enough in the script to merit award status. I was thoroughly impressed with the child actors, whose names should have received top billing. Meatloaf, as always, is fun to watch.
But acting aside, this film was sheer crap, wrought with cliche, sentimentality, and oh-so-pretty music to disguise the fact that this is a really lame story, re-told ad nauseum, which had nothing new to offer. "Loved the music!"... From now on when anyone tells me they "loved the music" from a movie I will refuse to watch it. Directors tend to use the musical score as a crutch to paint over their mistakes. When the entire score is THAT good, clue into the fact that he's blowing smoke in your eyes to hide the inherent flaw of the movie: that the story itself, from beginning to end, is flawed.
7-out-of-10, for acting alone.
But acting aside, this film was sheer crap, wrought with cliche, sentimentality, and oh-so-pretty music to disguise the fact that this is a really lame story, re-told ad nauseum, which had nothing new to offer. "Loved the music!"... From now on when anyone tells me they "loved the music" from a movie I will refuse to watch it. Directors tend to use the musical score as a crutch to paint over their mistakes. When the entire score is THAT good, clue into the fact that he's blowing smoke in your eyes to hide the inherent flaw of the movie: that the story itself, from beginning to end, is flawed.
7-out-of-10, for acting alone.