These three separate stories of women at turning points in their lives are very much in the mode of the stories the New Yorker was putting out 15 years ago (and perhaps still are; I haven't read a New Yorker in years). You've got a character, you have some events, and then the story ends and you say, not a hell of a lot happened here. These are pure character studies, and I'm not a big fan of character studies. I had mixed feelings about the film making. At times it seemed effective, at times it seemed a little gimmicky, as in still shot montages, and some things I couldn't make up my mind about. One was the voiceover, inexplicably spoken by a man even though the words feel very female. My first reaction to the voiceover was, here's an author so in love with her words that she couldn't give them up when moving from novel to film. On the other hand, some of the interesting insights in the movie couldn't really be expressed without voiceover. On the other hand, that's always the case with movies, and filmmakers have learned to accept that you can't give all your characters' inner thoughts and that that's okay.
But my main problem was I was just kind of bored by it all. Everything was mildly interesting but nothing really caught me, although the third story felt the most effective.
My girlfriend seemed very moved a couple of times, but that's not hard to do.
But my main problem was I was just kind of bored by it all. Everything was mildly interesting but nothing really caught me, although the third story felt the most effective.
My girlfriend seemed very moved a couple of times, but that's not hard to do.