Style: Suspense Drama
Director: Jonathan Darby
Starring: Jessica Lange, Gwyneth Paltrow, Hal Holbrook, Nina Foch, Debi Mazar
Operating Time: 96 minutes
Synopsis: New Yorker Helen (Gwyneth Paltrow) is in a severe relationship with Jackson (Jonathan Schaech). They head out to fulfill his widowed mom Martha (Jessica Lange), who lives at Kilronan, the household’s horse breeding countryside property. Martha is filled with pretend appeal and shows a possessive Jocasta complicated in direction of Jackson. Helen turns into pregnant, marries Jackson, they usually transfer into Kilronan to assist revitalize the property. Martha’s passive aggressive hostility in direction of Helen kicks into overdrive.
What Works Effectively: The overheated household dynamics are by no means boring, and the operating time is mercifully brief. Veterans Nina Foch (as Jackson’s grandmother Alice, banished by Martha from interacting with the household) and Hal Holbrook (because the city physician) add a gloss of undeserved high quality.
What Does Not Work As Effectively: This potboiler suffers from overacting (Lange, cigarette and drink over-emphasizing each line), non-acting (Paltrow, monotonously sleep-walking via the position), and under-acting (Schaech, his Jackson seemingly oblivious as his mom devours his spouse). Martha’s conniving is theatrical relatively than astute, the characters behave in keeping with the whims of the script relatively than with any conviction, and their evolutions are jarring.
Key Quote:
Alice (about Martha): She was a steady woman, shoveling horse shit!
