Pieces of April
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Movie Reviews of Pieces of April
Movie Review: A Secret Well Kept
Summary: 5 Stars
I just got through watching Pieces of April, and I must say "WOW". This picture is the best movie I have seen in a long time. The message sent in the picture is sent in an emotionally charged way, and Katie Holmes shines as April. Katie Holmes stars in this short independent film as April Burns, a confident 21 year old out in the world at large. But like most 21 year olds who show an exterior of rock, she is crumbling on the inside. She is estranged from her family, and the distance is finally beginning to get to her. She invites her family over for Thanksgiving dinner at her stylish East End Apartment. She just has one slight problem, her stove is broke. So the brunt of the movie is her going around the apartment complex looking for a stove. Along the way with each stranger she encounters you get more and more incite into her character's inner turmoil.
April is secretly looking forward to mending the fences with her family, but is nervous and not to hopeful about them even showing up. You can really see the emotion when April goes down to see her parents have left, and her heart is broken, but in end she gets her wish, and the family is reconciled for the time they have left together.
Oliver Platt is superb as April's Father, the only one who has been in constant contact with her.
Patricia Clarkson does indeed shine as April's condescending, cancer ridden mother, who is equally wanting to reconcile with her daughter, but is also unwilling to under go another disaster.
Movie Review: I knew she could do it!!
Summary: 5 Stars
thank god for POA! Katie Holmes is a great actress, but her roles up until this point, have proved otherwise. she's the best thing about all her films, but she never has to do much. in this film, she convincingly portrays a daughter estranged by her family more by their doing than hers. She didnt have to overact in this film to stand out, she stood her ground because she had a solid script to work with. this movie was very well rounded because it has perfect mix of comedy and drama. You really see how hard she's trying, so when things dont go as planned, you really feel for April. I really enjoyed everyone's performances in this film: from the father caught in the middle of everything, to the perfect child Beth, put on a pedastool not on her own, but by her mother. Jimmy the brother, that you're not really sure what to think of. he's just kind of there to make eveyrone's life easier. does what is needed. (including rolling his mothers joint. classic scene) Grandma Dottie suffers from alzeihemiers, but movie alzhemiers. you know the one. the kind that allows her to deliver the perfect one liners at the best time, therefore only allowing her to know what is going on, when necessary.
it is a slow film, and you must be willing to emotionally invest a lot, to enjoy it. but all the quirky people in this film make it utterly charming!
My only complaint is Katie's lack of attention. she far outshined Patty in this film, and i feel she deserves more credit than she got!
Movie Review: So very human . . .
Summary: 5 Stars
What makes this film stand out is its humanity. The most successful independent films are those that have well-rounded characters, and this is a stellar example. Read some of the reviews here: the authors have read so many different insights into these characters that you'd think they were talking about real people!
I liked this film when I first saw it, but when I caught the end of it on cable last night it brought me to tears, and here's why: it's one of the very few movies I've ever seen that really comes to terms with our mortality. A lot of people get killed in movies, but few confront death the way living, breathing people have to. I'm not just talking about death, whose imminence hovers over Joy and the whole family through the movie; I mean the the experience or possibility of failure in the face of one's most sincere and heroic efforts, which is April's life story. Every movie out of Hollywood tells you that you can make it if you just try. This movie holds you in suspense with the possibility that failure may be unavoidable.
Maybe it resonated for me because, as a spouse of a disabled person, I've had more contact with our human limits than most people my age. But I think anybody who has tried as hard as they can to reach for something or somebody and still come up short will recognize the pain of real life in these flawed, very human people.
Movie Review: All The Pieces Fit!
Summary: 5 Stars
This is the kind of film that will not get the attention it deserves. Black sheep `April' just wants to do something nice - like cook Thanksgiving dinner for her `none-too-eager' estranged family. The film is split between the family's road trip to the New York apartment and the tribulations of April desperately trying to cook a huge meal she has never attempted before. April's Mom (a fantastically complex Patricia Clarkson) is balancing all her emotions along with dealing with cancer. Dad (a thankfully subdued Oliver Pratt) tries to manage his wife, dippy son, prissy, peppy daughter and his cute, but Alzheimer suffering Mother (Alice Drummond; always good, but give this woman a character change!). The scenes are thankfully devoid of pratfalls and deliver real solid emotions and a few chuckles. Meanwhile April is meeting all of her apartment building owners for the first time, seeking an oven that will cook her turkey in time. This too, is full of small, precious moments that are subtle enough to ring true. It never gets sappy and each character delvers a believable performance. Even the ending is satisfying in a most unexpected way.A commentary by director Peter Hedges gives a great deal of insight into film making from the heart and the featurette is adequate for one viewing. The only other feature is the trailer.
Movie Review: spectacular low budget movie---a must see
Summary: 5 Stars
Although plenty of directors morph family dysfunction into humour, this movie is hardly a comedy, but more of a voyeristic and amusing drop-in on someone's Thanksgiving meal. Pretty Katie Holmes is believable as the angry, rebel daughter who, on the most stressed out of all holidays, decides to reach out across the cavernous divide of familial relations gone astray for that big one: approval from the family.
The claustrophobic, gritty and low-budget filming during a gray November is the key for the viewer to make the leap of faith past the comedic possibilities and upscale cast and submit to a sense of bleakness tinged with only a shred of hope. In fact, had the movie been expensive and slick, it might have had an oil and water combo of comedy and drama that equals another ho hum Hollywood soon to be forgetten flick. Not so here.
The characters are interesting and faulted in their own right, but for all their downfalls it's possible to have a sense of forgiveness for them. Patricia Clarkson does a beautiful job as the ascerbic, dying mother battling chemotherapy nausea and resignation in between glazed donuts. Although the movie does not succumb to sentimentality, better get out the tissues for the ending.