|
THEN SHE FOUND ME Send This Review to a Friend
Starting out as a film about an obsessed wife troubled by not being able to conceive a baby, the story of “Then She Found Me” adds issues involving the appearance of the mother of the woman, who had been given up for adoption. Much is interesting early in the film, but eventually it becomes so far-fetched in plot and behavior that the annoyance factor sets in. Are you ready for the sort of movie in which a woman feels compelled to say a Jewish prayer as she is about to be artificially inseminated? “Then She Found Me” pulls out corny stops, and then some.
You may be ready to believe Bette Midler as the overbearing television star Bernice Graves, who insensitively comes on excessively strong and without a clue as to the feelings her now-grown adopted daughter might have when Bernice blithely tries to establish a relationship. The film’s most fortunate quality is Helen Hunt’s acting as teacher April Epner, the baby-longing woman with repressed issues of having been an adopted child. She therefore doesn’t want to consider adopting a Chinese baby. Hunt also directs the film, but the screenplay, based on Elinor Lipman’s novel, on which Hunt collaborated with Alice Arlen and Victor Levin, is the undoing.
Matthew Broderick has a role as the wimp of a husband who walks out on April. Colin Firth, the father of one of April’s students, turns up as the new man in her life. He has complicated issues of his own, and we have a long road to travel before all gets happily settled.
One incident turned me off relatively early. When April goes to an upscale restaurant to meet Bernice, she gives only a coin to the ladies’ room attendant, explaining, “I’m a teacher.” It would be different if she only happened to be stuck with change at the moment, but it is downright insulting to teachers to suggest they wouldn’t be able to tip a dollar, especially since April is driving around Manhattan in a car. That’s a small matter and I know it is a joke, but it’s indicative of where this film’s head is at. ATHINKFilm release.
|