The Bottom Line
- Heartfelt tribute to family life
- Artful mix of pathos and humor
- Strong acting and appealing visual style
- Sometimes feels contrived and manipulative
- Some will find movie too whimsical and overly sentimental
- Film has little action and narrative is episodic
Description
- DVD containing drama "In America" (2002)
- Movie got 3 Oscar nominations: Best Actress, Best Supporting Actor, Best Original Screenplay
- Film stars Samantha Morton and Djimon Hounsou
- DVD provides 9 deleted scenes and alternate ending with optional director commentary
- DVD contains a making-of featurette (5 minutes)
- MPAA rating: PG-13 for some sexuality, drug references, brief violence and language
- Excellent picture and sound quality
- Feature run time: 1 hour 45 minutes
- DVD release date: May 11, 2004
Guide Review - "In America" DVD Review
"In America" received three Academy Award nominations: Best Actress (Samantha Morton), Best Supporting Actor (Djimon Hounsou), and Best Original Screenplay. The film was on scores of 2003 Top Ten lists, and after I watched it on DVD recently, I could see why. I found "In America" to be one of the most emotionally engaging movies I have ever seen.
After the death of their son, a young married couple and their two daughters relocate from Ireland to Manhattan, where they move into a tenement and befriend a terminally ill neighbor (Hounsou). While the daughters struggle to adjust to their new home, the husband drives a taxi and looks for acting jobs. Meanwhile, the wife (Morton) goes through a difficult pregnancy that runs up big medical bills.
I think what makes this movie work is that we see everything through the eyes of a 10-year-old girl. For her, Manhattan is a wonderland, but it's sometimes a frightening one. While she and her family share some good times, they also have to deal with problems. They are still grief-stricken over the death of her brother, but she finds comfort in her belief he left her three wishes. At key moments, she uses them, and the movie so successfully pulled me into her world that I found myself believing a little too.
Filmmaker Jim Sheridan's commentary deepened my understanding of the movie, and I'd particularly recommend it to anyone interested in screenwriting, filmmaking, or the deeper meaning of story.
