Tempers--and libidos!--are bound to flare up when a handsome young first-year resident at a Los Angeles hospital (Christian Bale) and his practicing M. D. girlfriend (Kate Beckinsale) go to stay with his promiscuous, pot-smoking record-producer mother (Frances McDormand) at her home in the Hollywood Hills. Sophomoric drama from writer-director Lisa Cholodenko, who handicaps her already beleaguered script--which sees Los Angeles as Partytown USA--with absolutely no grasp of musical or cultural history. What the filmmaker does have is a fetish for California architecture (with mailboxes piled up outside and buildings flashing by), and yet she treats it all as rustic eye-candy without subtext, so that the ambiance of the milieu nearly becomes irrelevant (this story could take place in Burbank). McDormand gives the film some personality (her straightforward, unhurried and unhindered nature does more for the picture than it does for her), but Bale and Beckinsale look and act like vapid supermodels and the subplot about a rock band trying to get their new record in the can is curiously naïve. ** from ****

As a huge fan of Frances McDormand, I went in seeing this movie with high expectations of her performance, and was not disappointed. As the record producer Jane, McDormand comes off as both worldywise and vulnerable. Jane's seeking shelter in the storm that is her life-she wants to connect with her son and future daughter-in-law, and she wants to find happiness in the arms of a much younger man, even though deep down she knows the relationship is all wrong. She's terrified of growing old, and has managed to combine single motherhood with a successful career. The always smoldering Christian Bale puts in a simmering sensual performance as her son-the-doctor Sam. Kate Beckinsale, as good as I have ever seen her since Cold Comfort Farm, is Alex, Sam's fiancé who decides to take a walk on the wild side while out in California. As a somewhat sheltered New Englander, she takes like a duck to water the laidback California lifestyle. The transformation is natural, and it does her character a world of good.

The chemistry between McDormand and Beckinsale is crackling throughout, and odd to say, there is more chemistry between these two actresses than there is between Beckinsale and Bale. When his character is sexually attracted to a fellow doctor (played by the ethereal Natasha McElhone) you almost find yourself rooting for the two of them to get together.

A friend recommended that I see this movie, and I am so glad she did-it is severely underrated, and an engaging character study.

I'm sure those reading this review have read the plot, so there is no need to go into it again. Frances McDormand transforms herself into yet another different character, Jane, than what she has played before, that of a Rock n' Roll producer who liked the 60's and 70's and decided to never leave the lifestyle, and she does it effortlessly and beautifully. That said, her character is a cliché, at best, which probably helped her step into that role. That is one of the problems with this movie. Most of the characters are clichéd caricatures of what we expect to see. In fact, the plot is so clichéd that you know what is going to happen about 10 minutes into the movie. Another problem with this movie is that if the character is not a cliché, it is an unbelievable character. There are two very noticeable and unbelievable deviations from the cliché. One is in Sam (Christian Bale). Sam is Jane's adult son and is the opposite of his mother, having disliked the lifestyle she immersed him in as a boy. He is pretty conservative and has recently graduated from Harvard Medical School. I've yet to see the son of anyone in that lifestyle decide they want to work long hours at a respectable job. Not very believable. But, Bale puts in a fine performance and is very likable and appealing to the audience. In Bale's case, it is not his fault that he is playing an unbelievable character, because he is very believable as a conservative Psych Doc. The problem lies in the writing of what created this character, his history. The second deviation is in Alex (Kate Beckinsale). Alex is Sam's girlfriend who has not only graduated from Harvard Medical, but is currently working on her dissertation. We're supposed to believe that Alex is so naive and has been so protected that once exposed to the lifestyle of Jane and the rock band she is producing, that she loses her inhibitions and ambition that has gotten her this far. Her slouch towards hedonism is brought about, not by Jane, but by her rock band's lead singer, Ian (Alessandro Nivola), who is also Jane's lover. The only problem is that there is no chemistry between Ian and Alex. There are a few witty comments and you can clearly see the actors looking on at each other to show there is an attraction. They don't even try to hide their supposed attraction when Sam is around (also unbelievable). Ian is yet another clichéd character in this mishmash of cliché and unbelievability. See this movie because both Frances McDormand and Christian Bale are masters of their craft and can pull you into any character they possess. But, expect to see them do this in a pathetic story line.