Some actresses are capable of giving wonderful performances even without the benefit of a solid script or a strong director. With "Where the Heart Is," Natalie Portman and Ashley Judd join that select group.
The movie itself is a shapeless, often downright baffling confection, made up of equal parts syrup, salt and good old-fashioned hogwash. It's drawn from a novel by Billie Letts that became a hot seller after it earned the Oprah Winfrey seal of approval. Often, as the film skips from corny comedy to unconvincing drama, it appears as if screenwriters Lowell Ganz and Babaloo Mandel completely missed whatever it was that made the book so special.
"Heart" was directed by Matt Williams, the man who helped develop "Roseanne" and whenever the picture reaches for some serious emotions, Williams tends to serve them up in the overearnest style of one of those dreaded "very special episodes" that turn up on sitcoms during sweeps week. Were it not for the presence of Portman and Judd, "Heart" could easily have turned into a pilot for a lame TV series. Call it "Wal-Mart Mama."
The story merrily skips through the five years following the day penniless, heavy-with-child Novalee Nation (Portman) was abandoned at a Wal-Mart in Sequoyah, Oklahoma. That's where Novalee gave birth to her daughter Americus -- cute is the name of the game here -- and where she found shelter with a good-natured recovering alcoholic named Sister Husband (Stockard Channing). What was Sister's brother named, you ask? Why, Brother Husband, of course.
See? C-u-t-e.
It doesn't stop there. Lexi (Judd), Novalee's confidante, has five kids, all of whom have been named after snack foods. The two women become close friends, perhaps because they're the only ones in Sequoyah who seem able to laugh away the problems of being barefoot and pregnant.
As "Heart" unfolds, the pair will weather kidnappings, natural disasters, abusive boyfriends, scheming relatives and much, much more. Whatever slight credibility the plot builds up is quickly erased after one character inherits $41,000 and proceeds to use it to build and furnish a house that must have cost at least five times that much.
Yet Judd and Portman seem to believe in this bunk and, to some extent, they convince us the movie is worth watching. Since her breakthrough role in "Ruby in Paradise," Judd has too often allowed herself to be straitjacketed in parts unworthy of her talent: "Double Jeopardy" and "Eye of the Beholder" were shining recent examples. Lexi isn't fully developed, but Judd's warmth and natural charm come through anyway. So does her sly way with a line, as when she asks Novalee if she can drive home slowly "so I can pretend it's a vacation."
Portman is the real engine of "Heart" though, and she delivers a marvelous, deeply moving snapshot of a woman who has to grow up quickly in a very short amount of time. As someone who claims she's "never lived any place that didn't have wheels underneath it," Novalee would seem ripe for parody, and plenty of actresses would have had a difficult time refraining from being condescending.
Not Portman. She seems completely sympathetic to Novalee's situation and never once does she drift into caricature or make a cheap joke about her. As she did in last year's much better "Anywhere But Here," Portman slips gently into her character and embodies her with spirit, grace and verve.
At one point, Novalee tells Lexi, "We've all got meanness in us, but we've got goodness, too, and the only thing worth living for is the good." That doesn't sound like anything a teen would tell her older friend, but Portman delivers it as if she believes every syllable. She does it so well in fact that maybe for just a moment we can believe it too. James Sanford
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