Hope Floats (1998)
Director: Forest Whitaker Cast: Sandra Bullock, Harry Connick Jr., Gena Rowlands, Mae Whitman, Michael Pare, Cameron Finley Screenplay: Steven Rogers Producers: Lynda Obst Runtime: 115 min. US Distribution: 20th Century Fox Rated PG-13: thematic elements
By Nathaniel R. Atcheson (nate@pyramid.net)
The best scene in Hope Floats is the first one, and I somehow knew that the rest of the film wouldn't live up to this scene even as I was watching it. We are introduced to Birdee Pruitt (Sandra Bullock), who is on a talk show thinking that she's getting a free makeover with her best friend. What Birdee actually learns on national television is that her best friend is having an affair with her husband. This is a funny scene, but it's also moving, and director Forest Whitaker does something that is not easily done -- he makes the character sympathetic before we know her.
It's also an interesting and unusual way to begin a really sentimental and formulaic bundle of schtick. After this beginning (which, unfortunately, belongs in a different film), Bridee leaves her husband and takes their daughter, Bernice (Mae Whitman), with her. She goes to stay with her mother, Ramona (Gena Rowlands), in Smithville, Texas. There, she drowns in her own self pity. She was once the most admired girl in the town (she was prom queen for three out of the four years of high school), but now that her peers have seen her emotionally disemboweled on a scummy talk show, she's little more than a town joke.
I'm sure that screenwriter Steven Rogers thought it necessary to add a love interest to this mix of ideas, so he did that. We learn of the existence of Justin Matisse (Harry Connick, Jr.), who, of course, has always had a crush on Birdee (but he detests the word "crush" and insists that it's only used in high school). Most of the conflict arises through the mother-daughter relationships, for young Bernice is not happy with her mother, and wants to believe that her father is going to come and save her from this awful little hick town.
I don't typically like movies like these because they only have one agenda -- to make you cry. I didn't cry at any point during Hope Floats, and I don't think I was more than a little bit moved by any of the scenes. There's a very significant problem in this, though, because the audience is supposed to care when good and bad things happen to characters in films. It's not really that the characters don't have enough development (because they do). I think the main problem is that every situation here is something that we've all seen in so many formulaic dramas just like this one.
Take, for instance, everything that has to do with Bernice. The child is upset because she needs to be upset because it works for the story. But the film never gives her much of a reason to be upset, and any child that age could probably understand the fact that her father was the one doing the bad stuff in the relationship. And if she has a deep, inexplicable resentment for her mother (which seems to be the only possibility that the film allows), then the entire story should be dedicated to that theme. In the end, though, the situation is concluded with an easy and unconvincing talk between Birdee and Bernice.
I know, I know, this is a "chick flick," right? It's supposed to be a little predictable, and just pretty safe all around, right? Well, why does it have to be? Why can't a film be engineered to appeal to people wanting lighter films and still surprise you with a few interesting turns in story and characterization? You can still have the obligatory happy ending and not make everything work out so perfectly well at the end. The biggest problem I have with movies like this is that the only reason things happen and characters exist is to get the story from point A to point B (I would elaborate on one particularly annoying element, but that would take the surprise out of it).
Still, Hope Floats isn't unbearable or even that difficult to sit through -- the actors all make the film watchable. Bullock is, in my humble opinion, a fantastic actress with a lot of strength. She holds this film together beyond Whitaker's sappy, heavy-handed direction, and keeps my interest in her strong. Also good is Connick, who gives a nice low-tone performance here. Rowlands is a pro, and handles this part like a pro. I didn't much care for young Mae Whitman, but that's mostly because the screenplay makes her such an annoying child. I did, however, greatly enjoy Cameron Finley, who plays the oddly eccentric young nephew of Birdee.
There are good things to be said about this film, but for the most part it doesn't have the sweeping emotional resonance that dramas need in order to be successful and moving. The pieces are in place for a good story, but Hope Floats instead relies on the good old formula, and the result is a picture that will show you a lot of things that you've probably seen a few times before.
** out of **** (5/10, C)
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Nathaniel R. Atcheson
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