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Cancer Major 
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TITLE |
Thousand Acres, A (1997) |
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DISABILITY |
Alzheimer's
Cancer Breast Mental |
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DIRECTOR |
Jocelyn
Moorhouse
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NOTES |
King Lear
transposed to the rich cornfields of Iowa. |
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Robards is
Larry (Lear) now not mad but with Alzheimer's. |
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Leigh is
Caroline, (Cordelia), Pfeiffer is Rose (Regan) who |
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has a
mastectomy and Lange is Ginny (Goneril). |
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From the
novel by Jane Smiley (highly recommended). |
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I remember
people raving about the book, then the film but |
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this is an
old story. And not because it resembles King Lear. |
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Pfeiffer has
had a mastectomy and is still going for checks. |
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Since she
had one breast removed her husband isn't too |
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interested
in her. We actually see her breasts and it's totally |
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This is
perhaps Pfeiffer's best acting performance though in |
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some ways
it's thrown away in this film. For me Pfeiffer and |
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Lange hold
together a disjoined script where one can easily |
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lose track
of who is married to whom and where motivation is |
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sadly
missing. Daddy's sudden switch from giving away his |
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property to
two of daughters and then siding with the daughter |
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(Jennifer
Jason Leigh) he had just rejected leaves the feeling |
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that
something got cut out. It's incomprehensible that Jessia |
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Lange's
husband tells Caroline that her father was kicked out |
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of the house
on a stormy night when he, himself, was a |
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witness to
the father storming off into the wind and rain. |
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Jennifer
Jason Leigh hardly gets a lookin. The returning son |
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breezes in,
sleeps with both of them and then goes away. |
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Pfeiffer has
a second mastectomy and more chemo. Lange |
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leaves her
husband and works as a waitress. |
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While we're
trying to work out what's going on the story of the |
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father's
incest with both his older daughters emerges, and |
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how they
protected the youngest from him. You think that |
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when the
fight over the land gets to court peoplepeople are going to hear about
this, especially Caroline. But no, the father reveals himself to be
senile and the verdict goes in favour of the women.
Overall the film is like some melodrama from the 30s. |
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Notes
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