Okay, I'll be honest - the only reason I added this flick to my Netflix Queue was because of the cast. I didn't think it sounded super interesting, but it had three actors that I REALLY like in it, so I thought I would give it a shot.
Joaquin Phoenix ("Return to Paradise") and Jennifer Connelly ("The Rocketeer") star as a couple who have a son that is killed in a hit and run accident. Mark Ruffalo ("You Can Count on Me") stars as the man who drove the car that killed their son.
The acting is AMAZING. Really. Joaquin appears completely different, with a beard, and plays the upset and confused father role to perfection. His obsessive nature begins to cause turmoil with his wife, and they have some amazing scenes together - arguing over how each one of them is grieving. It's some powerful stuff.
Mark Ruffalo does an amazing job of playing a man burdened by guilt, and is constantly attempting to convince himself to do the right thing. He too does a really good job.
My biggest issue with the film is that it relies too much on the "small town" aspect of things to get the story moving. There are too many characters that intertwine into the lives of the two main groups of people, and too many things are left to chance. Needless to say, I know this type of thing must happen everyday in America, and 99% of the time its never resolved - but maybe this script focuses on one of those small towns in the Northeast (where everyone is a Red Sox fan!) and its a place where you can constantly interact with someone who killed your son, and not even know it. I don't know. I just didn't buy the believability of that aspect of the story.
It's also a SLOW film. It's very emotion-driven. And to be honest, it's a good thing I watched it at work, where I had nothing else to do. Because if i were at home with all of the distractions of home - then I may never have gotten through the entire film, or if I did - I wouldn't have paid attention to half of it.
And the worst part is the anti-climactic ending. It really falls short of delivering me any kind of "pay off" for watching the first hour and a half. Aside from the character study - that is the middle of the film - there's really not much else to watch in this one. Just some amazing performances, ruined by a bleak story that is about as interesting as a heart monitor on a dead person.
Result: 2 1/2 Stars out of 5.
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