Nurse Betty
by Neil LaBute
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DVD Cover Information
Actor: Aaron Eckhart, Chris Rock, Greg Kinnear, Morgan Freeman, Renée ZellwegerDirector: Neil LaBute
Brand: NBC Universal
Producer: Albert M. Shapiro
Producer: Chris Sievernich
Producer: Gail Mutrux
Producer: Moritz Borman
Producer: Philip Steuer
Writer: James Flamberg
Writer: John C. Richards
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); Spanish (Original Language)
Format: Closed-captioned, Color, DVD, NTSC, Widescreen
Picture Format: 2.35:1
Running Time: 110 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2003-01-07
Audience Rating: R (Restricted)
Studio: Universal Studios
Movie Reviews of Nurse Betty
Movie Review: He Ate Her Cupcake
Summary: 5 Stars
Neil Labute's Nurse Betty overtly and comically emphasizes the panoptical regime, the discriminatory male gaze, which is best described in John Berger's Ways of Seeing, "Men act and women appear."Betty Sizemore (Renee Zellweger), disrespected as a waitress at her job and at home by her sleazy husband, finds recluse in what every housewife enjoys, soap operas. After witnessing her husband's grisly murder, she lives out the metaphor of panopticon; she loses control of her own actions and desires in order to please an audience, regardless of whether one exists or doesn't. She submits herself by becoming Nurse Betty and travels to Los Angeles to rekindle a never-existant love to her soap opera hero, Dr. David Ravelle (Greg Kinnear). The film further emphasizes Betty as the surveyed by following her with a host of male surveyors: a reporter, a sheriff, a television producer, and a pair of stalkers; each of whom see her as nothing more than part of their own job.
The film is sarcastic to its very core. The objectification of women and beautiful stereotypes is captured to draw attention to itself. Betty becomes an object when she loses her sanity and mentally becomes a soap opera character. The characters she encounters on her way fall into existing general stereotypes, which covers race, class, and gender. For example, Rosa and her mother appear as never-satisfied, moody Latinos. The transparent objectivity of characters invites the viewer to detach from the story in a Brechtian fashion, and dwell on the issue of viewing. One can critique how people view a film, but it is rare to openly critique how people view women.
Summary of Nurse Betty
Betty never misses an episode of her favorite soap opera, "A Reason to Love". After a mind-altering run-in with two hit-men while watching an episode, Betty transforms into 'Nurse Betty' and embarks on a mission to find her true love, Dr. David Revell. Follow Betty on a wild and hysterical cross-country trek in search of the man of her dreams. But, can Betty find him before the hit-men find her? Starring 3-time Oscar nominee Morgan Freeman (Seven), Renee Zellweger (Me, Myself and Irene), Chris Rock (Lethal Weapon 4) and Academy Award and Golden Globe nominee Greg Kinnear (As Good As It Gets). Starring: Rene Zellweger, Greg Kinnear, Morgan Freeman, Chris Rock, Aaron Eckhart, Crispin Glover, Allison Janney, Pruitt Taylor Vince, Elizabeth Mitchell, Sheila Kelley Directed by: Neil LaButeA frenzied, screwball comedy with a lighter-than-light touch, Nurse Betty is a radical departure for director Neil LaBute, who helmed the vitriolic In the Company of Men and Your Friends and Neighbors. Betty (Renée Zellweger) is a perky Kansas waitress whose sole happiness comes from her obsession with the television soap A Reason to Love, starring dreamboat doctor David Ravell (Greg Kinnear). When her slimy car-dealer husband (Aaron Eckhart) enters into a drug transaction that goes horribly awry, Betty inadvertently witnesses the carnage and, in shock, becomes Nurse Betty, determined to reunite with her long-lost love, Dr. Ravell. Tailed by two hit men (Morgan Freeman and Chris Rock), Betty heads to L.A. a determined woman, unaware she has their huge drug stash in tow. Though it takes a good half-hour to get going, once LaBute and the movie hit top speed, it's a surreal, often brilliant ride, as Betty's fantasy and reality collide, with unexpected (really unexpected) developments. The screenplay (by John C. Richards and James Flamberg) is wickedly inventive, and like his previous films, LaBute has assembled a peerless cast. Zellweger is charming and daffy in her best performance since Jerry Maguire, and Freeman is by turns menacing and touchingly romantic in his obsession with Betty. Kinnear is the epitome of self-serving shallowness (and makes us love him all the more for it), and Rock finally shakes his standup persona and emerges as a great comic actor. Look also for a scene-stealing Allison Janney as the producer of Kinnear's soap. Most movies rarely get such talent operating at full capacity, and Nurse Betty soars because of it. --Mark Englehart
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