Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #14012 in Movie
• Released on: 2008-03-28
• Rating: R (Restricted)
• Running time: 128 minutes

Customer Reviews

A MOVIE TO TOUCH YOUR HEART
GET READY WITH THE TISSUES, HOWEVER, THE MOVIE IS SO TRUE TO LIFE AND WHAT HAPPENS WITHIN A FAMILY TOUCHED WITH A CANCER VICTIM. I CAN RELATE TO SO MUCH OF THE MOVIE. IF YOU WANT TO KNOW HOW CANCER CAN AFFECT YOUR FAMILY AND WHAT GOOD CAN COME FROM GIVING FROM THE HEART, THIS MOVIE WILL GIVE YOU INSIGHT TO WHAT IT TAKES TO BE THE CARE GIVER AS WELL AS THE CANCER PATIENT. THE MOVIE IS WELL DONE AND I GIVE IT A FIVE STAR FOR QUALITY PRODUCTION. IF YOU HAVE JUST GONE THROUGH A TRAGIC SITUATION WITH CANCER, GET READY FOR SCENES WHICH WILL GIVE YOU INSIGHT INTO WHY PEOPLE ACT AS THEY DO.

Shifting Perceptions Lead to a "True" Understanding
"One True Thing" beautifully and poignantly demonstrates that appearances can be deceiving, and that what one sees on the surface doesn't necessarily reflect the deeper truth. In this brilliantly acted film, Zellweger (the daughter), discovers that her notions about her parents (Streep and Hurt) and about marriage in general were illusions, and, in turn, comes to a greater understanding of both her parents and the realities of marriage.

Zellweger's relationship with her mother was always strained. and she looked down upon her mother's life thinking it provincial and small. Her father, the college department head and National Book Award winner, however, was put on a pedestal, appearing larger than life to her. When Zellweger moves back home to nurse her dying mother, she painfully discovers that her father treats her accomplishments as "small" and irrelevant (comparable to her view of her mother), and that he is far removed from her idealized image of him. She, in turn, comes to a new admiration and appreciation for her mother's perserverance and wisdom about life.

Streep, one of our greatest actresses, can communicate more with a look on her expressive face than most actresses can with hours of dialogue. Zellweger, another talented performer, more than holds her own with the formidable acting talents of Streep. The two of them together create scenes of enormous power and emotional energy. They make this perceptive and absorbing film an unforgettable experience.

A Wonderful and Interesting Family Drama!
It seems less and less frequently that we get to see a superbly assembled cast of actors united in a story that tells itself in terms of its human interest, level of drama, and opportunity to learn something from the characters about the nature of life, relationships, and ultimately about ourselves. This movie offers such an opportunity. All of the cast memebers, but especially Meryl Streep and William Hurt, do an outstanding job in presenting this tale of a family in crisis, and the hidden secrets, weaknesses and strengths of its members and their enduring bonds to each other. The photography is well done, and the sound is excellent as well.

This is a worthwhile and serious movie, involving some interesting intellectual issues about how the needs of a family of strong but loving individuals and quite strong and needy personalities clash and interact with each other over an increasingly critical stage of terminal illness for the matriarchal mother of this modern American family. Overall, then, I recommend this as an absorbing examination of an intellectual family with a range of family issues such as rilvary, and a number of hidden dimensions to the relationships within the family itself. It is painful to watch each of them struggle to deal with a member's decline and death due to cancer. One of the increasingly rare worthwhile movie experiences, and one well worth owning.