TARA ROAD

REVIEWED BY CHARITY BISHOP

Our rating: 4 out of 5

Because of: language, sensuality

Rated:

In the early nineties, authoress Maeve Binchy wrote a book that became an instant overnight sensation, both in Europe and the United States. Tara Road is a somewhat streamlined adaptation of her book by the same name. It manages to hit all the high points but ultimately is not as memorable as it should have been. Nevertheless, it is entertaining and keeps the same twist and turns magic of the novel.

Everything in the world of Marilyn (Andie MacDowell) and Ria (Olivia Williams) is falling apart. They share a common bond of tragedy even though they are thousands of miles apart. Marilyn has lost her son to a tragic motorcycle accident and it is tearing apart her relationship with her husband. When he goes to Hawaii on a business trip, she opts to stay home in the hopes of finding somewhere else she can console her grief. Remembering that she spent a happy summer with her child in Ireland, she picks up the phone and calls the only Irish number in her husband's Rolladex. On the other end of the line is Ria, who has just suffered the devastating news that her husband Danny (Ian Glen) is leaving her for his much younger, pregnant girlfriend. Marilyn and Ria come up with a scheme to switch houses, keys, cars, everything, for a few months in order to escape.

Despite the fact that the men in their life think it is foolish to pull up stakes and leave, Marilyn gets on a plane for Ireland and Ria flies in to her sunny house in the United States. Both of them are hoping to spend some time alone, but their new neighbors have no intention of letting them brood. Marilyn's eccentric friends take Ria under their wing immediately, while Rosemary (Maria Doyle Kennedy) and Colm (Stephen Rea) look after the grief-stricken Marilyn. Each woman will encounter new friends over the summer and come to learn what it really means to have family.

Ultimately, in that sense the movie is satisfying even though it is also extremely sad. Marilyn is devastated by her son's loss and emotionally isolates herself from everyone around her. Then there is the side plot with Danny going into financial straits and the concern that Ria may lose the house on Tara Road as a result. If you are thinking the plot sounds a little bit like The Holiday, you would be right, but two women exchanging homes is where the similarity ends. What the audience gets a grasp of is that it must have been a very good book, but the actresses did not necessarily translate their characters well onto the screen. MacDowell was a casting mistake. There is no warmth or chemistry about her, so she makes Marilyn uninteresting and cold. Ian Glen was also miscast. He did a fine job, but frankly, he is too ordinary looking to make his womanizing convincing. 

Ria becomes friends with Marilyn's brother and they conduct a relationship. Even though he proposes they sleep together without any strings attached, the audience never knows if she goes through with it or not. Marilyn is attracted to Colm, but to my surprise, she refuses to go any further than friendship, since she wants "nothing to happen that I cannot tell my husband." Marilyn discovers Danny has been seeing another woman for a number of years. There are a handful of profanities and four or so harsh abuses of Jesus' name. Ria breaks some windows and vases by throwing them at her husband.

In some respects the movie was very good. I liked that there was no easy solution to most of the problems both families were facing. I liked that each woman had to come to a realization about her life and her relationships and make a conscious decision to change. I liked that those who made immoral choices were ultimately held accountable for their actions. What I did not like was how passionless the production felt. Even though both women are going through immense grief, somehow the audience never really become emotionally invested. My emotions were no different by the end than they were at the beginning. Still, it is a relatively clean film much more complicated than it seems at first glance, and that alone gives it clout.