The Hours Review
by Jon Popick (jpopick AT sick-boy DOT com)December 20th, 2002
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For an uneducated, lowbrow humor-loving dimwit like me, the only thing worse than seeing a movie called Mrs. Dalloway would be reading a book called Mrs. Dalloway. So the prospect of watching a film based on a book written by somebody with a major hard-on for Virginia Woolf didn't seem at all appealing, considering Woolf is the one responsible for Dalloway.
Sure, it has an amazing cast, but I was still surprised to discover The Hours was actually a very good film, despite my wariness of its close relationship to the aforementioned bore. Like Rebecca Miller's Personal Velocity, The Hours is broken into three separate stories set in three distinctly different periods (though two of them ultimately intersect). Unlike Velocity, however, it's much easier to distinguish the connection between the trio of narrative threads, which are interspersed rather than shown individually from start to finish.
The three stories all revolve around Woolf's Mrs. Dalloway in some way or another. After its opening scene shows the depressed writer drown herself in 1941 Sussex, we're quickly transported to three different settings - 1923 Richmond, 1951 Los Angeles and 2001 Manhattan. In the first, we see Woolf (Nicole Kidman, The Others) on the day she began writing Dalloway. The second features a melancholy housewife named Laura Brown (Julianne Moore, Far From Heaven), and the third shines the spotlight on Clarissa Vaughn (Meryl Streep, Adaptation), a book editor who masks her depression by concentrating on throwing a big party.
Those of you familiar with Dalloway will already notice the connections between that book's heroine and Clarissa. They share the same first name, and they're pretty much the same character, despite the differences in their surroundings. Our Clarissa lives with girlfriend Sally (Allison Janney, The West Wing), but back in her hetero days she used to be married to Richard (Ed Harris, A Beautiful Mind), a writer-poet whose most recent work just won some kind of major prize. Clarissa is busy planning the post-event festivity for her AIDS-stricken ex, who even calls her "Mrs. Dalloway," just in case you can't make the connection on your own.
The pregnant Laura Brown is planning a party, too, though hers is much more low-key than Clarissa's. It's her husband Dan's (John C. Reilly, Gangs of New York) birthday, and while she attempts to make a cake with little son Richie (Jack Rovello), Laura splits her remaining time between reading Mrs. Dalloway and repressing the urge to kill herself with sleeping pills. Richie knows there's something way off about his mom, and he freaks out when she drops him off at a friend's house because he understands how unstable Laura is.
Meanwhile, back in 1923, we see Virginia smoking pot, furiously scribbling her new novel onto a pad, and arguing with husband Leonard (Stephen Dillane, The Truth About Charlie) about the need to kill off one of her characters. This bothers Leonard because he knows his wife suffers from depression. In fact, the couple moved to Richmond to get away from the bustle of London, which didn't seem to mesh with Virginia's personality. Well, she ain't doing much better in the country, either.
On the surface, it appears the only connection between the three stories are Dalloway - one character is writing it, one is reading it, and one is living it. But the comparisons run much, much deeper. Like Dalloway, The Hours' shows one day in the life of these women - an ordinary day that roughly sums up their entire existences. Each story is about a person gravely concerned about a loved one committing suicide. Each story is about a woman whose idea of happiness and complacency is about to get turned on its ear. Each character has their day interrupted by a visitor, too (the star parade includes Claire Danes, Jeff Daniels, Toni Collette, Miranda Richardson and Eileen Atkins, who penned the boring screen adaptation of Dalloway). There's probably more connections, too, but remember - I'm an uneducated, lowbrow humor-loving dimwit.
The Hours, which was Woolf's working title for Dalloway, was directed by Stephen Daldry (Billy Elliot) and written by playwright David Hare (Damage), who adapted the complex story from Michael Cunningham's 1998 Pulitzer Prize-winning novel. Like Traffic - though not quite to that degree - The Hours has three different looks for each of the eras depicted, as well as a dazzling score from Phillip Glass. It may be tough to notice, however, what with the incredible performances in each of the three stories. With her highly publicized phony nose, Kidman becomes an entirely different creature, from the way she moves to the way she talks to the way her dull clothes hang off her gawky body. I don't know if it's her, or if the nose is magical, but one of them deserves an Oscar nomination. As good as Moore is, this role is overshadowed by her turn in Far From Heaven, which is really quite similar. Streep is Streep - I could watch her read a phone book, or even something written by Kevin Costner. Her story is, unfortunately, the weakest of the three.
1:54 - PG-13 for mature thematic elements, some disturbing images and brief language
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