The Family Stone

Ok...I didn't know what to expect but the commercials looked wonderfully disfunctional and funny and I think Luke Wilson, Craig T. Nelson, and Diane Keaton are great so we went to see a movie this evening - The Family Stone.

Spoiler: If ya don't want to know, don't read on...

Yeah. Someone should have probably mentioned that Diane Keaton's character, Sybil the mother, had a recurring case of, and as it is alluded to in the movie, a terminal case of breast cancer and is dead at the end of the film. Sheesh.

The movie was brilliant in parts, complex, funny, breath catching and breath taking. It moved back and forth from drama to comedy (some might say too much or too unevenly because we wanted to know why Meredith was having a prissy hard time and she never says or because we wanted to know why the youngest sister was so mean and she never quite says - love maybe or the lack thereof? anway...). I highly recommend it - it was magnificent. Wonderfully written and engaging and well-acted by all involved.

And I really wouldn't have EVER watched it if I'd known ahead of time about the mother. I can honestly say that I have NEVER been to a movie where I have openly bawled, required napkins for use as kleenex, and had to focus diligently on throwing away my popcorn bucket and coke cup so I wouldn't collapse in tears on the way out. Yup, that's right. I was a basket case. Gee, I guess it has something to do with my family's history of breast cancer (fortunately my grandmother, aunt and mother are all suvivors of it - not with the grim prognosis that Sybil had) but still. I was blindsided - a bit.

And glad I was with a friend who didn't think my response was nuts. Because I was suprised by my own response to be honest.

So, while I have said that I would not have seen it, I can also say that I'm really glad I did. It was a magnificently emotional film, if you like that kind of thing....