Double Feature

April 2010 - Oscar showed his feminine side this year. For the first time, the Academy Award for Best Director went to a woman. And, not only did Kathryn Bigelow walk away with that trophy, her independent film The Hurt Locker outclassed the big studio blockbuster directed by her ex-husband James Cameron. Take that, Avatar! So, here are two other female-driven films that deserve a look even though they didn’t win any Oscars.

Amy Adams and Emily Blunt play sisters who go into an unusual and, in their case, ironic line of business in Sunshine Cleaning, an R-rated drama from 2008. Alan Arkin also stars as their dad.

Adams is Rose Lorkowski, a single mom who works for a cleaning service. Blunt is her younger sister, Norah, who can't manage to keep a job. Norah watches Rose's son, Oscar, while Rose carries on an affair with her married high school sweetheart.

At his suggestion, Rose and Norah start a business cleaning up scenes where someone has died. While Rose concentrates on building the business, Norah is obsessed with tracking down the daughter of a woman who drank herself to death. Norah finds her, but waits to tell her about her mother. That's just one of the ways that things get complicated in this neat little film from director Christine Jeffs and writer Megan Holley.

Overall review: Ehhh, it was OK. The characters are interesting and the performances are good. The film is definitely worth a look. My major issue is that there seems to be a lot of unfinished business here. I would have liked some of the story lines to be tied up a little more tightly.

Loose ends are tied up neatly in Waitress, a PG-13 comedy from writer/director/actress Adrienne Shelly. She was murdered about six months before the movie came out in May 2007. Shelly has a supporting role while Keri Russell (Felicity) and Nathan Fillion (Castle) play the leads. The cast also includes Cheryl Hines, Jeremy Sisto and Andy Griffith.

Russell plays Jenna, an unhappily married woman who works as a waitress at Joe's Pie Diner. Jenna's unique talent is concocting delicious pies with fanciful names for any occasion. As the film opens, Jenna learns she is pregnant and quickly thinks up a recipe for "Bad Baby Pie."

Although she's not happy about being pregnant, Jenna plans to have the baby. She meets Dr. Pomatter (Fillion), the new OB/GYN in town, and the two quickly start an affair. At the same time, Jenna is trying to save enough money to leave her controlling husband (Sisto). She gets some help in this department from Joe (Griffith), the curmudgeonly owner of the diner.

Overall review: Liked it. A quirky, likeable movie with quirky, likeable characters. Russell is in nearly every scene and does a good job of carrying the movie. The supporting actors flesh out their roles well, creating full characters despite limited screen time. Andy Griffith, especially, is a treat.