Mary Kay Place

Jeff Daniels, Jon Heder, and Diane Keaton star in director Tim Hamilton's domestic comedy concerning a slacker who finds his status as man of the house challenged when his single mother begins dating a self-help guru. As the influence of youth gradually gives way to the wisdom of age, the stage is set for a confrontation from which only one side can emerge victorious. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

A less than auspicious homecoming for an introspective artist sets the stage for this low-key comedy drama directed by Steve Buscemi. Jim (Casey Affleck) is a chronically glum aspiring novelist who, after a failed two-year sojourn in New York City, has returned home to his parents' home in Goshen, IN. Jim's folks, Don (Seymour Cassel) and Sally (Mary Kay Place), run a ladder factory, a family business Jim wants nothing to do with. His older brother, Tim (Kevin Corrigan), is also living at home, and has problems of his own after his marriage ended in divorce and his business went broke. When Tim makes the latest of a number of suicide attempts by driving into a tree, Jim is reintroduced to Anika (Liv Tyler), a nurse who had a one-night fling with Jim a while ago. Jim and Anika strike up a conversation and start seeing one another again, though she seems to have feelings for Tim as well. With Tim in the hospital, Jim is persuaded against his better judgment to take on some of his brother's responsibilities, including doing some work at the ladder factory. At work, he bonds with his uncle Stacy (Mark Boone Jr.), who prefers to use the nickname "Evil" and deals drugs on the job. Jim's attempts to help Uncle Stacy with his side business backfire and implicate his parents, with Sally ending up in jail. But between his budding relationship with Anika and coaching a kids' basketball team that includes Tim's daughters, Jim begins to cautiously consider the notion that life might be worth all the trouble. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Filmmaker Rodrigo García takes an unusual look into the lives of nine different women in this episodic drama. Each of the film's nine sequences has been staged as a single shot, using the Steadicam system to allow the camera to follow the action fluidly and without cuts. In these short episodes (lasting between ten and 14 minutes), Holly (Lisa Gay Hamilton) has a brief moment of reverie while confronting the specters of her past in her old neighborhood. Maggie (Glenn Close) escorts her young daughter Maria (Dakota Fanning) to a cemetery as they visit the graves of their family members. Ruth (Sissy Spacek) is a married woman contemplating an affair while visiting Henry (Aidan Quinn) in his hotel room. Diana (Robin Wright Penn) unexpectedly runs into an old boyfriend, Damian (Jason Isaacs), while shopping for groceries. Camilla (Kathy Baker) is a hospital patient awaiting surgery for cancer. Samantha (Amanda Seyfried) is a teenage girl who helps look after her handicapped father Larry (Ian McShane). Sandra (Elpidia Carrillo) is a female prison inmate who is expecting a visit from her children. Sonia (Holly Hunter) lashes out at her boyfriend Martin (Stephen Dillane) when she finds out he's been cheating on her. And Lorna (Amy Brenneman) has an unexpectedly moving encounter with her ex-husband Andrew (William Fichtner) as she pays her respects to his second wife, who has just passed away. Nine Lives premiered at the 2005 Sundance Film Festival. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Celebrated writer and director John Sayles turns his eye to politics in America in this drama. The son of respected Colorado politician Senator Jud Pilager (Michael Murphy), Dicky Pilager (Chris Cooper) is a charming but half-bright man with a bad habit of mangling the English language and a decided lack of political correctness. Dicky is also in the midst of a hard-fought campaign to become governor of Colorado. Dicky's campaign manager, Chuck Raven (Richard Dreyfuss), is a ruthless sort who will leave no stone unturned to see that his candidate wins, so when Dicky snags a dead body while fishing during the shooting of a campaign commercial, Raven is determined to find out if his man has been set up. Raven hires Danny O'Brien (Danny Huston), a former journalist turned private investigator, to find out who the dead man is and if he might be connected to Pilager's enemies. But the deeper O'Brien digs into the matter, the more he finds out about the candidate and his family -- and very little of it is flattering. John Sayles assembled a typically impressive cast for Silver City, with the supporting cast highlighted by Tim Roth, Kris Kristofferson, Maria Bello, Thora Birch, Daryl Hannah, Billy Zane, and Mary Kay Place. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Sweet Home Alabama screenwriter C. Jay Cox directs the independent romance Latter Days. Christian (Wesley A. Ramsey) is a young gay party boy who lives in Southern California. When a group of good-looking Mormon missionary guys move into his apartment complex, he's determined to pick one up. He ends up falling for sweet, innocent Mormon Aaron Davis (Steve Sandvoss), who's secretly struggling with his sexuality. Aaron slowly falls for Christian, even though he thinks he's shallow. The romance causes problems in both worlds. Christian tries to develop a conscience and ends up meeting Keith (Erik Palladino), a man dying of AIDS. Aaron has the difficult job of coming out to his mom (Mary Kay Place) and to his fellow missionaries. He comes against harsh criticism from the blatantly homophobic Ryder (Joseph Gordon-Levitt). Latter Days won awards at the Philadelphia Lesbian and Gay Film Festival and L.A. Outfest. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, All Movie Guide

After establishing herself as a bankable star with the fish out of water comedy Legally Blonde, Reese Witherspoon returns in what could be described as a "fish back in water" comedy. Melanie Carmichael (Witherspoon) is a successful New York fashion designer who is dating Andrew Hennings (Patrick Dempsey), a wealthy socialite whose mother, Katherine Hennings (Candice Bergen), is the Big Apple's mayor. One day, Andrew pops the big question and asks Melanie to marry him; Melanie is overjoyed, but unknown to Andrew, Melanie has some unfinished business to take care of first. Despite her polished uptown image, Melanie grew up poor in the deep South, and as a teenager she married her high school sweetheart Jake Perry (Josh Lucas). Things went sour and Melanie moved East, reinventing herself along the way, but Jake never bothered to legally end their marriage. Now Melanie has to return to her hometown of Pigeon Creek, AL, to tell her parents (Fred Ward and Mary Kay Place) the news and convince Jake to grant her a divorce; however, the more time she spends with her old flame, the more she feels sparks flying between them again, while she also learns her Eastern affectations don't fly with everyone back home. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

A man struggling to do the right thing for his child finds himself at odds with his family in this emotional drama. Tony Romano (Harvey Keitel) runs a successful clothing company in New York City; eager to share his good fortune with his family, Tony's daughter and younger son both have important positions in the firm, while his wife Fern (Mary Kay Place) has a solid business of her own running a flower shop. Tony's oldest son Jeff (Brad Rowe), however, lives in Los Angeles and is trying to get a career as a screenwriter off the ground. Jeff is already a father as the result of a short and ill-advised romance with a woman with poor self-esteem, and when he finds himself falling for Kelly (Rachel Blanchard), who works at a plasma center where Jeff sells his blood, history repeats itself and Kelly finds herself pregnant. Jeff and Kelly initially decide that an abortion would be the logical answer, but in time Kelly changes her mind, and Jeff feels he must handle his share of the responsibilities. Tony is convinced Jeff will be throwing his life away if he stays with Kelly to raise the baby (especially since Jeff admits he doesn't love her); while Jeff is determined to do the right thing for his child, he is torn between his need to face up to his responsibilities and his love for his father. Nailed was the first feature film from writer and director Joel Silverman. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Video director Michel Gondry and scriptwriter Charles Kaufman -- who shot to fame after penning Being John Malkovich -- collaborate on this bizarre fable about human behavior in and out of society. The film opens by quickly introducing the three leads -- Lila (Patricia Arquette) who is locked away in prison; Puff (Rhys Ifans) who is testifying before Congress; and Nathan Bronfman (Tim Robbins) who is sitting in a glowing white afterlife waiting room with a bullet hole in his head. Rewinding to the beginning of the story, the film shows Lila as a girl about to enter womanhood. Unfortunately, puberty goes horribly awry and she starts to grow thick hair all over her body. After performing as Queen Kong in a circus freak show, she chucks it all and goes to live in the forest, where she becomes the best-selling author of a misanthropic hard-line ecological tome. At age 30, her itch for male companionship becomes overwhelming and she ventures back into the city. She is helped by electrolysis guru Louise (Rosie Perez), who not only makes Lila presentable to society, but introduces her to Nathan, a 35-year-old virgin who, as a scientist, has devoted his life to teaching table etiquette to lab mice. While showing Nathan the joys of the wild outdoors, Lila and her new beau discover an extremely hirsute feral man whom they dub Puff. Placing him a cage in his lab, Nathan sets out to teach Puff the ways of polite society while dreaming of fame and fortune. The first task is to curb Puff's enormous sexual appetite -- any time he catches sight of a female, Puff either tries to hump her or masturbates vigorously. Nathan yokes him with an electric collar that shocks him any time he acts unseemly. Unfortunately, the humans on the other side of the cage can't quite control their libidos either: Nathan succumbs to the incessant double entendres of his saucy French assistant Gabrielle (Miranda Otto) while Lila finds an animalistic lust for Nathan's science experiment. This film was screened at the 2001 Cannes Film Festival. ~ Jonathan Crow, All Movie Guide

Following up on her 1998 opus Bedrooms and Hallways, Rose Troche directs this ensemble film about suburbia and its discontents. Once an up-and-coming singer/songwriter, Paul Gold (Joshua Jackson) now lies in a coma, attentively nursed by his mother Esther (Glenn Close), who dotes on her son to the exclusion of her husband and her daughter Julie (Jessica Campbell). Meanwhile, Jim Train (Dermot Mulroney) is a workaholic lawyer who is closer to his tortes than to his spouse Susan (Moira Kelly). Their son Jake has taken a morbid fascination with his sister's foot-high girl doll. At the same time, Paul's former lover Annette Jennings (Patricia Clarkson) is trying to pull her life and her family back together after a particularly brutal divorce. This film was screened at the 2001 Toronto Film Festival. ~ Jonathan Crow, All Movie Guide

A real-life murder story that commanded headlines for several months in 1990 served as the basis for the tense but unsatisfying cable-TV movie Judgment Day: Ellie Nesler Story. Christine Lahti stars as Ellie Nesler, who cannot help but notice that her seven-year-old son Brandon (Andrew Ducote) has been sullen and withdrawn since returning from summer camp. Eventually it is revealed that Brandon had been sexually molested by camp counselor Daniel Driver (Robert Bockstael)--and that Driver has had a history of such repellant behavior, but has managed to remain out of prison thanks to the loopholes of the legal system. Driven over the edge when Driver beats the rap once more, Ellie confronts the man outside a courtroom and shoots him dead! The rest of the film recounts Ellie's murder trial, and the spectacular outpouring of public reaction--both pro and con--in its wake. Though it is uncompromising in detailing the long-range consequences of the actions by both Ellie Nesler and Daniel Driver, the film refuses to take a definite stance of its own in the controversy, and thus its dramatic impact is muted. Judgment Day: The Ellie Nesler Story made its USA cable network debut on June 23, 1999. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Would you pay money to journey into the mind of the star of Con Air, The Killing Fields, and In The Line of Fire? Puppeteer Craig Schwartz (John Cusack) is having money problems, so he takes a temporary job as a file clerk on the seventh-and-a-half floor of a large office building. One day, while rummaging behind a cabinet, he finds a small door that leads to the center of the mind of actor John Malkovich (played by, you guessed it, John Malkovich). Craig discovers that entering the portal allows him to become John Malkovich for a brief spell, and in time he and his beautiful but aloof co-worker Maxine (Catherine Keener) get the bright idea to charge admission for the privilege of spending 15 minutes inside the head of a well-known actor. Malkovich realizes that something strange is happening to him, but can do little to stop it, as strangers take over his mind for a quarter-hour at a time. Craig's wife Lotte (Cameron Diaz) eventually takes a trip into Malkovich's psyche, and she soon finds herself in love with Maxine, with whom Malkovich has an affair; meanwhile, Maxine in time becomes infatuated with both Craig and Lotte, but only when they're inside Malkovich. Being John Malkovich marked the feature-length debut of director Spike Jonze, who previously made acclaimed music videos for Weezer, The Beastie Boys, and The Breeders, among others. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide