Tara Road

Been really wanting to see this movie and it is just being released in North America now so here is my review...

The good - Anything by Maeve Binchy has to be great. Love her work. Her stories, her characters. Really liked "Danny" - he was just as I had imagined him. Also liked "Colm" and "Mona". Loved the scenery of Dublin and seeing what Tara Road looked like. The house is beautiful. Have always liked Andie McDowell... more on that later. The movie is good if taken on its own merit as a story on its own.

The bad - The characters of Ria, Rosemary and Marilyn were just not right. In the book Ria has curly unruly hair and undergoes more of a transformation in Ireland. Marilyn is supposed to be uptight and with short hair... didn't get that here. Rosemary is supposed to be gorgeous - again, not here. Many of the US characters seem more like caricatures than anything. And Andy Vine looks terrible - why would anyone find him attractive compared to Danny?

The ugly - it just differed from the book too much. The book is great and I wanted to see it put on film. This was different, in the same way Circle of Friends was different. If you are a Maeve Binchy fan you will enjoy seeing this on the screen, but it is not the Tara Road I read and loved.

Andie MacDowell and Olivia Williams play American and Irish women respectively. Based on Maeve Binchy's novel, Marilyn Vine, must deal with her son's tragic death on his birthday in Connecticut. Ria has to deal with her husband's infidelity with her best friend Rosemary. The film is beautifully photographed with Brenda Fricker and Stephen Rea in supporting roles in Ireland. Ruby Wax plays Carlotta, Marilyn's American friend and neighbor. I don't think they filmed the Connecticut scenes in the states though perhaps for financial reasons. The film is ideal viewing for Hallmark and Lifetime movies though.

One of Maeve Binchey's most popular novels, complete with a useful American angle, this was an obvious choice for the big screen. However, the story of two women (one Irish, one American) who house-swap makes for a difficult transition in practice. Quite a long novel, it also compresses awkwardly, losing much of its charm and intelligence along the way. The film is not helped by lack-lustre central performances. MacDowell seems out of practice, and Williams (almost invariably seen hitherto in starchy British roles) does not make a convincing Irish housewife. Her emoting seems brittle (even shrill) and she seems uncomfortable with emotion generally. Overall the film looks good and is well filmed, but does not hold the attention except perhaps for die-hard Binchey fans, many of whom will be disappointed at the inevitable over-simplification.

Andie MacDowell played an American wife, Marilyn Vine, and Olivia Williams played Ria, the Irish wife and mother. Marilyn loses her son tragically on his fifteenth birthday. Her marriage falls apart as well. By chance, Ria and Marilyn connect by telephone and decide to swap houses in Connecticut and Ireland. Marilyn goes to Ireland and tries to heal her devastating loss. Ria goes to Connecticut in America to escape her husband's infidelity with her best friend. I enjoy the supporting cast especially Ruby Wax OBE as Carlotta; Stephen Rea and Brenda Fricker. It is the kind of film made for Lifetime and Hallmark channel. If you enjoyed the novel, you will enjoy the movie adaptation.

Two women on two different parts of the world, and both dealing with crises in their lives, decide to take a breather from the situations they are facing, and swap houses. Thus, Marilyn, an American woman who is grieving after the tragic death of her son, goes to Dublin, to the Tara Road house of Ria, who gets the Connecticut house of the Yankee woman. This premise, which is the basis of Maeve Binchy's novel, seems to be almost the same plot of the recent film "The Vacation" in which a similar situation takes place.

Unfortunately, the material written for the screen, doesn't add anything new. In fact, this is a film full of stereotypes on both sides of the Atlantic. Not having read the original work, one can't really say what went wrong, but based on the thin screen play of the movie, one loses all kind of interest in what is presented. Director Gillies McKinnon has done better movies before. Alas, this one will not add anything to his CV.

The best thing in "Tara Road" is Olivia Williams, an fine young actress who seems to be above and beyond what she is being asked to do. Andie MacDowell casts a gloomy aura in her portrayal of Marilyn. Fine actors are completely wasted, as is the case with Brenda Fricker, Stephen Rea, the young and beautiful Sarah Bolger, who we admired for her work in "In America".

As soap operas go, this film will, no doubt, appeal to a certain type of movie goer. Thankfully we didn't have to pay for it since it was shown on cable, recently.