One True Thing 1998

     This film is adapted from a 1995 novel by Anna Quindlen who was a former New York Times columnist.  Ellen goes home for Thanksgiving in 1987 and her father asks her to stay home to take care of her mother who is being treated for cancer.  Ellen would like to go back to New York to her apartment and her New York Magazine job.  She is working on an investigative article and it's her biggest story.  She has always wanted to be different from her mother but being at home makes her like her mother.  Kate is just 48 and she doesn’t want care.   She really needs help even though she doesn’t want to stop doing everything she used to do.  Ellen’s attitude changes when her mother’s condition continues to worsen and the next Thanksgiving could be her last.

     Locations in New Jersey were used for the Eastern coastal college town feel.  You really want to kick William Hurt’s character as the father.  Is this really the time to be thinking about yourself when your wife is dying?  The story and characters seem real and you wish the circumstances were different for Ellen and Kate.  3 ½* (I liked this movie)

128 min, Drama directed by Carl Franklin with Meryl Streep, Renee Zellweger, William Hurt, Tom Everett Scott, Lauren Graham Nicky Katt, James Eckhouse, Patrick Breen, Gerritt Graham.

Note:  Blockbuster 3 ½*, imdb 6.8 out of 10, 89% critic and 65% audience on Rotten Tomatoes.