Word: momma
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...revolves around his family. The death of his father has left Gilbert in charge, and as his once-beautiful mother's way of mourning is to wallow in grotesque obesity, his older sister Amy (Laura Harrington) has taken over the maternal role. The Grape family is frozen in time. Momma's immobility reduces her to a permanent state of infancy, and mentally handicapped brother Arnie (Leonardo DiCaprio) needs constant supervision...
...what keeps him from doing better. Home for the Grapes is Endora, obviously christened by screenwriter Peter Hedges after the verb "to endure." Run-down and depressed, Endora suffers from and delights in the great wheel of American capitalism. What keeps Gilbert planted in this morbid spot is Momma (Darlene Cates). Most of the time Momma sits planted on a sofa in front of the TV, where she sleeps at night, and where the girls dutifully pull up a table at meal times. Meanwhile, the house, which Mr. Grape built and died in, has rotted to the point where...
...heard this one before: except for Momma, it's The Last Picture Show. This picture show doesn't match that one. The script, by Peter Hedges from his novel, spins out a few too many eccentricities, and the direction, by Lasse Hallstrom (My Life as a Dog), meanders. But DiCaprio and Cates bring loopy authenticity to their roles, and Depp is, as always, a most effacing star. Here, as in Edward Scissorhands and Benny & Joon, he behaves wonderfully on screen. He should be even better when he gets the chance to misbehave as a demented director in Tim Burton...
Bette Midler makes Gypsy's Momma Rose...
...artistically. She has always been more of a personality than an actress, more engaging as herself than as someone else, save in her exquisite portrayal of a doomed Janis Joplinesque singer in The Rose. Midler's style is ironic, mocking, frequently distanced from the material she is playing. The Momma Rose of Gypsy is a desperate, driven woman, unfazed by law or morality in her single-minded pursuit of stardom for her children and, by proxy, herself. Her life is about perseverance, not talent. Irony has no place in her makeup...