emisue02

Try watching this movie sometime with a white woman who is the adoptive mother of an African-American child. I happen to baby-sit such a family and watched the movie with the kids' mother. I don't know how she sat through it without throwing something at the screen-not that this is necessarily a criticism. This film is very thought-provoking, though I think for the wrong reasons. The main focus is all about color and whether people should raise children of different races. Jessica Lange's character had a small speech in the courtroom about how love makes a family more than race, but it was just glossed over and the focus of the film went right back to race defining families. Maybe I just see this differently because of my close association with a family where the parents and one child are white and the other child is not, but family is not about race-corny as this may sound, it really is about love and support. The ending, as some other reviewers have said, is very wishy-washy. My viewing companion and her husband, who joined us at the end, liked it because they want to have a good relationship with their daughter's birth mother. I agree with them on that, but if the movie is going to deal with legalities so much, it should resolve those legalities at the end of the movie.

I've dubbed this movie "Love Actually, Or How Far We Can Stretch Emilie's Heartstrings in 2 Hours" for a reason-it's amazing!!!! The three climaxes at the end of the movie, where the three main plotlines come to a resolution, are all an emotional roller-coaster ride. I can't say enough good things about this movie. Yes, it has some flaws, yes, I think it has a few too many f-words and nude scenes, but as I tell people, you forget about all that and just get so caught up in the sweeping stories. The music is brilliantly used, especially at the very beginning and the very end, to weave the stories together. I'm "high" for days after seeing this movie that's so full of wit, charm, and Capra-style belief in triumph of the good things in life,namely love.