Susan Granger’s review of “Georgia Rule” (Universal Pictures)
If this dysfunctional three-generational drama/comedy is Hollywood’s Mother’s Day gift, the motion picture business is in worse shape than I thought.
Rachel Wilcox (Lindsay Lohan) is a sassy, seductive, rebellious teen who is exiled to spend the summer with her no-nonsense grandmother Georgia (Jane Fonda) in Hull, Idaho, when Lilly (Felicity Huffman), her alcoholic mother, can no longer cope with her.
Rhyming with dull, Hull is a rural Mormon town where everyone says “Good Morning,” children are well mannered and teens don’t drink, smoke, blaspheme, take drugs or have sex until they’re married. Furthermore, Georgia’s household runs by strict rules. While she wasn’t a good mother to Lilly, Georgia gets a second chance with Rachel, who reveals a secret that can make or break the family.
Lindsay Lohan made headlines when she failed to show up for work and was publicly reprimanded, but she’s pitch-perfect. The problem lies in Mark Andrus’ character-driven script, an unsettling mixture of insight and uncertainty, and while the cynical dialogue can be wryly amusing, it’s rarely realistic. Garry Marshall’s direction is unevenly paced and surprisingly derivative. The scene where people are fighting on Georgia’s front lawn and she tries to break it up by wetting them down with a garden hose is straight out of Jodie Foster’s “Home for the Holidays.”
Felicity Huffman accesses fragile Lilly’s confusion, and Jane Fonda shows true grit after her “Monster-in-Law” debacle. Cary Elwes, Dermot Mulroney and Garrett Hedlund lend oddball male support but, dramatically, the movie is only a step up from a flop. On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “Georgia Rule” is a convoluted, contrived, clichŽ-ridden 5, evoking Robert Frost’s “Home is the place where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in.”
