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Tuesday, 20 May 2008 |
 Starring Helen Hunt, Bette Midler; Directed by Helen Hunt
I have never been one to put ‘good’ and ‘Bette Midler’ in the same sentence, but here it is. Bette Midler is the one good thing about Helen Hunt’s directorial debut, Then She Found Me. Midler is the titular she, Bernice, a TV talk show host who walks into the life of her biological daughter April (Hunt) the day her adoptive mother dies. April has also been dumped by her husband (Matthew Broderick) and the bio-clock is ticking. Loudly.
This aspiring screwball/indie/serio-dramedy is stuffed with genre staples from potential boyfriend to fake break-up. It is further crippled by out-of-control sign posting and predictability: there are few surprises, which only leaves performance for entertainment. Midler is one of the few bright spots in an otherwise lumpy and rather unfunny affair. An actress whose candid campery is well suited to the role, she elevates that which Hunt otherwise fills with a cloying sense of dread and desperation.
Seldom has a comedy needed Prozac quite like this. In some deep, dark corner of Then She Found Me there is an uproarious romcom about life, death and everything in-between aching to get out. If only Hunt had found a way to set it free.
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