Ever since Paleolithic times, when cave painters dallied with their client's mates, people have wondered just how much bad behaviour should be tolerated in the name of Art. Ted Cole (Jeff Bridges) is your typical bad ass artist/writer who cheats on his wife, humiliates his models and exploits an innocent teenager for his own ends. He has succeeded not as he wanted as the F Scott Fitzgerald of his era, but as the author of children's books. His wife Marion (Kim Basinger) tolerates Ed's affairs but then becomes involved with the hapless teenager, Eddie (Jon Foster) Ted hires as an "assistant". Ted might be a bad-ass but the ghosts of two dead children hang heavily over the household and what narrative interest there is in the film revolves around how they got that way.
The acting is the strongest feature of this movie, which is an adaptation of the first third of John Irving's novel "A Widow for One Year". No-one was nominated for an academy award (though Kim Basinger did win an Oscar in 1998 for best supporting actress in "LA Confidential"). Yet both Jeff Bridges and Kim are outstanding. Jeff uses his "good ole boy" persona to create a character both repugnant and oddly sympathetic, assisted perhaps by some slapstick episodes, while Kim gives us a compelling portrait of a woman still in shock after the loss of her children. Jon Foster, as Eddie, is weak and unappealing, but perhaps that's the point. Six years old and the veteran of at least three earlier films, Elle Fanning is quite charming as Ted and Marion's youngest child Ruth (the central character in the novel).
The (almost) first time director, Tod Williams, makes good use of the Hamptons (Long Island) setting an attractive counterpoint to the unattractive people. The period is indefinite it feels like 20-30 years ago (Ted still uses a typewriter and owns a 240 series Volvo) - but then Ted is a timeless character. Which brings me back to the question how much bastardry is acceptable in the production of great art? Well I suppose ultimately it doesn't matter Picasso's work endures, as does Shakespeare's (about whose personal life we know next to nothing) regardless. Without his art Ted would probably be a total psychopath; instead he does at least produce some good children's books. My daughter once found Roald Dahl a rather scary person to interview, but he too delivered the goods.
The acting is the strongest feature of this movie, which is an adaptation of the first third of John Irving's novel "A Widow for One Year". No-one was nominated for an academy award (though Kim Basinger did win an Oscar in 1998 for best supporting actress in "LA Confidential"). Yet both Jeff Bridges and Kim are outstanding. Jeff uses his "good ole boy" persona to create a character both repugnant and oddly sympathetic, assisted perhaps by some slapstick episodes, while Kim gives us a compelling portrait of a woman still in shock after the loss of her children. Jon Foster, as Eddie, is weak and unappealing, but perhaps that's the point. Six years old and the veteran of at least three earlier films, Elle Fanning is quite charming as Ted and Marion's youngest child Ruth (the central character in the novel).
The (almost) first time director, Tod Williams, makes good use of the Hamptons (Long Island) setting an attractive counterpoint to the unattractive people. The period is indefinite it feels like 20-30 years ago (Ted still uses a typewriter and owns a 240 series Volvo) - but then Ted is a timeless character. Which brings me back to the question how much bastardry is acceptable in the production of great art? Well I suppose ultimately it doesn't matter Picasso's work endures, as does Shakespeare's (about whose personal life we know next to nothing) regardless. Without his art Ted would probably be a total psychopath; instead he does at least produce some good children's books. My daughter once found Roald Dahl a rather scary person to interview, but he too delivered the goods.