Pieces Of April
Filed Under: Film, Reviews | Article Tags : DVD review
By: The Dweeb
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You would think with a plot line like this you would be watching a fairly decent comedy film here, possibly something along the lines of The Royal Tenenbaums. Alas, it wasn’t as funny and when it tried to be serious that didn’t work much either for me. Somehow, when it was over, I felt this film was missing a lot. I think the writer had just begun to scratch the surface with all these characters but never delved any deeper, leaving me wanting to see more.
April (Katie Holmes) is supposed to be this black sheep in her family, I didn’t see anything like that in her. What did she do in the past that makes her this bad person? Aside from moving away to New York and never speak to her mother again, she didn’t come across as this bad person. She was genuinely trying to make up for her past troubles by attempting this Thanksgiving dinner. We only hear a few hints about her past, but nothing concrete. We don’t ever find out why she stopped talking to her mother. Sure she shows some anger, but it seemed forced to me. She is actually a very likable character, I suppose that’s what the director intended.
Because I hated her real family, especially her bratty sister Beth (Alison Pill). Egad! Someone please shoot her to put us out of our misery. Oh and her mother (Patricia Clarkson) as well. No, I did not feel sorry for her even if they did hint that she had cancer and that it is possibly terminal. I say that because they never make that clear, they tended to dance around it. I guess all the throwing up, wig adjusting and smoking pot was a hint. Even under these circumstances, she still manages to constantly poop on her estranged daughters attempts at reconciliation. She can’t even remember what anything good about April, transposing Beth’s memories with Aprils.
The only redeeming character is her father, played by Oliver Platt. He’s the only one with enough sense to see what she is trying to do. He stays true to the mission, to get to New York before the whole thing falls apart. For the majority of the film, they spent a lot of time in the car, but they didn’t seem to go anywhere. And when they finally reach their goal, the movie is basically over. We only get to see a small portion of what happens when they finally meet.
The other half of the film, and the more interesting portion in my view, is April’s struggle to make her first Thanksgiving meal. Her oven decided to not work on that day so she spends most of the day trying to find a working oven. Along the way she meets her interesting neighbors. Especially Wayne (Sean Hayes), who I’m still trying to figure out. What the heck was his deal? Was he trying to hit on her? Was he English? Was he gay? Why is such a well dressed dapper man living in such a crappy apartment building? Those answers we may never know, because the movie was so short.
Since this is obviously a lower budgeted Indy film, it mainly shot with a hand held camera. The image is constantly moving around, almost in a documentary style. There are lots of tight close ups intermixed with wider shots. I felt really cramped in the scenes in the apartment. The film quality itself wasn’t that great, it comes across fairly grainy and there’s a fair amount of distortion as well as muted colors. I would take a guess that this was shot on video first before it was transferred to film.
The extras portion of the DVD is on the lighter side. Well, with such a short run time anyways there probably wasn’t much material to work with in the first place. Included is the usual making of featurette, a trailer and a commentary track. The rest of the disc is filled with promotional materials for other MGM films. As with the movie, the package is just ok, not great by any means.
Pieces of April is not a stinker, so don’t completely discount it yet. It just seemed to leave me hanging for more. It didn’t impress me as I thought it would. For my money, it would be better spent on something else.
Reviewer’s Opinion: BORROW IT!!
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