The Patron Saint of Liars

Another voice added to the comment choir. This is a pretty awful movie that allows one to wander the house, do laundry, read a book (even the book upon which the movie is based) and still be bored with it (the movie that is). Add my vote to those who hated the lead character. She isn't presented as a patron saint but more of an excellent liar and fairly worthless character. People like Rose may have a few screws loose or lost but whatever the reason for her behavior, I can't work up the empathy to care. Gist of review: Sticking with this movie is like watching the wrong shade of paint dry on your walls so you can finally repaint with a better color. Fortunately, viewers can avoid the wait by just changing the channel.

Recently this movie was on Lifetime. It is about a woman who leaves her husband for no reason when she becomes pregnant. She goes into hiding to give up her child at a convent. The story gives no apparent reason for her running away until the very ending, which makes no sense. She then marries again, while still married to her first husband, to the grounds keeper, Clancy Brown. She decides to keep her baby and lives in a separate home from her husband and child at the convent. Years go by of the couple living apart and the child grows up thinking her mother doesn't love and care for her. Then after a mail incident, her first husband finds her and comes looking for his wife, which of course he is still in love with. Then the story finally unwinds and we find out why this woman runs from her family, which of course is very weak, and leaves the viewer full of questions that are never answered. I watched this whole story to find out the reasoning of a religious event that happens in the first 5 minutes of the movie with a sick child becoming well after a spring of water appears out of the ground, at the very end of the movie the spring appears again, when the lady who runs stops running, I don't see how the 2 relate to the story line that seemed to be full of holes, and how a woman can leave her child and have that child have peace suddenly at the end of the movie is a bit to far fetched for me! I would not waste my time with this movie. One of the worst I have seen.

After reading the Patron Saint of Liars, I could not wait to watch the movie. They ruined it by trying to make a happy ending. The whole point of the book was to show us how some people just can never face life. The reason I loved the book was because for days you thought about Rose, what made her run away from her first life, what made her run away from her second life. You wondered what ever happened to her. This is the problem with Hollywood and why I like Foreign films better. They show life as it really is. Not a neatly tied up ending with, gag me, the healing spring suddenly sprouting forth again, everyone hugging and loving one another again. The book was so much better than the film.

It is a weak movie, but it is based on a great book. The Patron Saint of Liars is a sad story of a woman unhappy with who she is. It details how she runs from her life then she puts herself into another life. She is never quite happy with her second life either. The story is sad, but interesting. You relate to her and feel sorry for her at the same time. The movie is much slower than the book, and not as deep. The book takes you in more and allows you to relate more to the characters and their feelings. Dana Delany is kind of bland in the lead role. It does have a small early role for Maggie Gyllenhal.It is worth a watch, but definitely worth reading.

Ann Patchett's book is much better but as movie adaptations go this is fine. It is worth watching just to see the great Sada Thompson as Sister Evangeline. That doesn't mean the other actors aren't fine it is just that Sada stands out. People may wonder why Dana Delaney sets off for Kentucky. I read the book so long ago I don't know if this was gone into. There is also fine work from Clancy Brown who plays Mr. Niceguy. A far cry from the demonic minister he played on two seasons of HBO'S CARNIVALE. The featured players are good too. Filmed on location in North Carolina which probably comes close to Kentucky where the story takes place. Read the book and watch the movie and see why Sada Thompson is one of America's finest actresses.