Wednesday

Yesterday I had to choose between seeing a film that looks good but whose star I don't like, or a film that looks bad but whose star I do like. For some reason, I chose the latter: Sherrybaby, starring Maggie Gyllenhaal. There seemed to be two types of audience member: women who had come along for a warming story of a single mother's struggle, and lonely men who had come to see Gyllenhaal naked. It wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. It's a reasonably compelling character study of a woman released from jail trying to re-engage with her daughter, despite the reluctance of her brother and sister-in-law who now look after her, with at least one interesting twist. The performance of Gyllenhaal was excellent, but I also thought that of the daughter was exceptional too - very natural for a kid her age. Sherry is a fairly wretched character, who you don't believe should be allowed to look after the daughter, and I was glad that the ending wasn't sentimentally happy - it's a good conclusion, half-hopeful, and I think some audience members thought 'what? that's it?' at the end. Overall, though, the movie didn't go much deeper than the surface, and glossed over things that needed more emphasis. Some critics have said it feels like a TV movie, and I can see what they mean, but that's a bit unfair. It is much better than that, but it did need a more profound script. As it was, it felt fairly empty, but is definitely worth watching for fans of the brilliant Gyllenhaal.