2002

March 18, 2003
Century Mountain View
USA
English
125 minutes

Jack Nicholson. Hope Davis. Dermot Mulroney. Kathy Bates.

In what may be Nicholson's quietest performance, he plays a newly retired actuary. He finds himself alone and in an RV driving around the country all the while writing letters to a child he sponsored in Africa. It is basically the story of a man whose life did not measure up to the dreams he had for it. His career, wife, and daughter all grew at their own pace, not his. Bates is terrific as the tactless mother of the man his daughter is about to marry. The same director as ELECTION, he is a master at capturing the slow pace of the midwest, often using local actors. It was funny in the darkest of ways.

8.8 Critical Consensus