Two Weeks Movie Review

Charming, lively and sad, "Two Weeks" is a great example of tender and touching film making. A must see for Sally Field's fans, and a-should-not-miss for everyone else. "Two Weeks" is an elegant examination of family, love, and death.

Anita Bergman (Sally Field) lies dying as her four children come to be there with her as she dies. Keith, (Ben Chaplin), her oldest son arrives to help his sister Emily (Julianne Nicholson) who has been with her mom for weeks. Keith is a film maker who lives in California and of all the children, encourages his mother to fight and survive, even though it is obvious there is no hope for survival. Emily spends a lot of time reading books to find guidance to help her mother die peacefully and gracefully. She neglects her own emotion during her mothers dying process. Barry (Tom Cavanagh) the uptight corporate type arrives in full corporate glory, cell phone attached to his ear, laptop in toe and chalked full of workaholic madness. Last to arrive is Matthew (Glenn Howerton) and his bitchy wife Katrina (Clea Duvall). Katrina brings her uncaring attitude and Matthew his helplessness. As each child arrives Anita greets them saying, "Thank you for coming." As their mother fades away, the siblings find ways to love and hate each other.

Dying on film is a challenge; no one who has ever experienced it has come back to tell us what it felt like or to reenact it for us. So many thespians succumb to forced breath followed by the death rattle as their interpretation of passing on to the other side. The spectacular Sally Field finds a way to die with grace, and adroitness. Even though her death is painful, she doesn't roll around screaming; her performance is intuitive and humanly ethereal. The stages of Anita's death are handled with a perceptive delicacy that is rarely seen on film.

Julianne Nicholson could be Sally Field's real life daughter because in "Two Weeks" there performances rival each other. As each of Emily's siblings arrives you can see her emotional boundaries attenuating diaphanously in front of your eyes. Nicholson's portrayal of a woman forsaking all care of herself to devote all her energy for her dying mother is incisive and penetrating. She eloquently exudes an inhuman strength that only occasionally, momentarily, shivers.

Ben Chaplin's character Keith is in deep denial about his mother's death. Ben Chaplin's bright eyed bushy tailed enthusiasm for experimental medicines in the hope of saving his far gone mother. As the film progresses, layer by layer his denial is painfully stripped from him like sandpaper taking layers of skin. In the beginning of "Two Weeks" Chaplin gives Keith a snotty, sad and pitiful disposition but as the film progresses he begins the stages of grief in ways that range from practical to poignant. The end of the movie is Chaplin's shinning star. With no skin left to protect him from his grief, he breaks down in unexpected ways.

Cut into the film is an interview Keith does with Anita when she realizes she is going to die but while she still looks healthy. While it is a beautiful example of the caliber of Sally Fields acting, it also is a gleaming example of how voice acting can be just as effective as visual acting, care of Chaplin. Keith's interview is evocative, emotive and solicitous. It is to Chaplin's credit Keith's interview doesn't turn into masked monologue.

"Two Weeks" is brilliant because it uses humor to increase the levels of anguish and to face a stage of our lives no person wants to embrace. Some scenes could lead you to believe that the film is a comedy. When the characters have to deal with emotionally draining events, things that usually would only make them giggle are triumphs of serotonin. Writer/director Steve Stockman gave a natural balance of pain coupled with breaks of levity that makes the dying bearable.

"Two Weeks" coalesces phenomenal writing, marvelous acting and attention to timing and emotional detail into cinematic luminosity.