Hope Floats . Gambit Weekly . 06-15-98

Hope Floats

DIRECTED BY: Forest Whitaker

REVIEWED: 06-15-98

Sandra Bullock really needs some better material. She burst into America's consciousness in the original Speed and enjoyed her 15 minutes of success with the sweet While You Were Sleeping. But since then, it's been dogsville: Two If By Sea, In Love and War and the especially egregious Speed 2. Now comes Hope Floats, and she's still on a losing streak. Bullock can act, but she has to have a script with something approaching a character in a story worth watching. No such luck here.

Hope Floats tells the story of Birdee Pruitt, a former prom queen who, when she finds her husband's a cheater, returns to her small Texas hometown with her 9-year-old daughter Bernice (Mae Whitman). Back home, Birdee has to put up with her ditsy mom (Gena Rowlands), whose underdeveloped eccentricities means that she's the world's greatest grandmom. Birdee has no job skills, but she gets work at a photo shop. Meanwhile, Bernice has to put up with the school bully. All is eased as Birdee is gradually enticed into a romantic relationship with old homey Justin Matisse (Harry Connick Jr.). And that's all, folks. We see every move this flick is going to make. There's more plot tension in a growing lawn.

--Rick Barton

Capsule Reviews
Hope Floats

Other Films by Forest Whitaker
Waiting to Exhale

Film Vault Suggested Links
Marius and Jeannette
How Stella Got Her Groove Back
Home for the Holidays

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