Susan Granger’s review of “The Hours” (Paramount Pictures)
Depression, disaster and death mark Stephen Daldry’s superbly crafted chronicle of a single day in the lives of three repressed, fearful women from different eras who are emotionally touched by Virginia Woolf’s insightful 1923 novel “Mrs. Dalloway.” As the complex tripartite story opens, writer Virginia Woolf (Nicole Kidman, almost unrecognizable with a prosthetic nose) drowns herself in 1941 in Sussex, England. A flashback then explains who she is, how she was moved from London by her doting husband (Stephen Dillane) and why she chooses suicide. Meticulously intercut within her cerebral tale are two other profiles. In 1951 in Los Angeles, there’s emotionally – and sexually – unfulfilled Laura (Julianne Moore), housewife/mother of a young son (Jack Rovello) and pregnant with her second child, who is obsessed with making a birthday cake for her husband (John C. Reilly) when she learns about the upcoming surgery of a friend (Toni Collette). In contemporary Manhattan, there’s Clarissa (Meryl Streep), an editor nicknamed ‘Mrs. Dalloway’ after the heroine “always giving parties to cover the silence,” who is preparing a celebration for her former lover (Ed Harris), a poet dying of AIDS. A visit from his ex-lover (Jeff Daniels) evokes poignant memories, despite her serene lesbian relationship with Sally (Allison Janney) and the support of her daughter (Claire Danes). David Hare’s atmospheric melodrama, based on Michael Cunningham’s Pulitzer Prize-winning best-seller, is blessed with exquisite performances and seamless cross-cutting between historical time periods. On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “The Hours” is a contemplative 8, seriously asserting, “Someone has to die so we will value life more.” Borrowing from Almodovar, it’s “Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown.”
Susan Granger's review of "The Hours" (Paramount Pictures) Depression, disaster and death mark Stephen Daldry's superbly crafted chronicle of a single day in the lives of three repressed, fearful women from different eras who are emotionally touched by Virginia Woolf's insightful 1923 novel "Mrs. Dalloway." As the complex tripartite story opens, writer Virginia Woolf (Nicole Kidman, almost unrecognizable with a prosthetic nose) drowns herself in 1941 in Sussex, England. A flashback then explains who she is, how she was moved from London by her doting husband (Stephen Dillane) and why she chooses suicide. Meticulously intercut within her cerebral tale are two other profiles. In 1951 in Los Angeles, there's emotionally - and sexually - unfulfilled Laura (Julianne Moore), housewife/mother of a young son (Jack Rovello) and pregnant with her second child, who is obsessed with making a birthday cake for her husband (John C. Reilly) when she learns about the upcoming surgery of a friend (Toni Collette). In contemporary Manhattan, there's Clarissa (Meryl Streep), an editor nicknamed 'Mrs. Dalloway' after the heroine "always giving parties to cover the silence," who is preparing a celebration for her former lover (Ed Harris), a poet dying of AIDS. A visit from his ex-lover (Jeff Daniels) evokes poignant memories, despite her serene lesbian relationship with Sally (Allison Janney) and the support of her daughter (Claire Danes). David Hare's atmospheric melodrama, based on Michael Cunningham's Pulitzer Prize-winning best-seller, is blessed with exquisite performances and seamless cross-cutting between historical time periods. On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, "The Hours" is a contemplative 8, seriously asserting, "Someone has to die so we will value life more." Borrowing from Almodovar, it's "Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown."