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DJ Supply

'Two Weeks'
(Sally Field, Ben Chaplin, et al / DVD / NR / (2006) 2007 / 20th Century Fox)

Overview: Four siblings rush home to say a last goodbye to their very sick mother. When she hangs on, they find themselves trapped together for two weeks. Through laughter and tears, they come to terms with the tragedies we all must face, and rediscover the joy we find in each other. What happens to a family when the one person who holds it together can't hold on anymore?

DVD Verdict: "Two Weeks," written and directed by Steve Stockman, is the story of a woman dying from ovarian cancer and her four adult children as they gather at her Wilmington, N.C., home for what they believe to be her final days. The loss of a parent is difficult under any circumstances, and a movie that dares to take on the situation as its premise enters precarious territories at best.

Stockman, a veteran of TV commercials making his feature debut, mostly avoids those two pitfalls but otherwise stumbles in his attempt to deal with this complex emotional scenario. Despite striking a chord in terms of sibling politics and the inelegant ways we deal with death, "Two Weeks" too often feels as if it's destined for heavy rotation on the Lifetime Movie Network.

The adorable Sally Field is perfectly fine as the doomed Anita Bergman, but the understated role seems artificially inflated by interspersed clips in which Anita's eldest son, Keith, a Hollywood filmmaker, interviews her for posterity. The segments do little to advance the story other than providing clunky exposition, which in some cases is at odds with what's going on in the movie.

Ben Chaplin plays Keith, the de facto protagonist, a rumpled, Zen-spouting, recovering alcoholic whose siblings ridicule him for eating tofu dogs. Keith's desire to remain detached is at odds with his dutiful sister, Emily (Julianne Nicholson), who has been devotedly on the scene for a while before she picks up Keith from the airport and plies him with texts from the death and dying section of the local bookstore.

The second brother, Barry (Tom Cavanagh, TV's "Ed"), a slick corporate type, impatiently arrives, expecting to make a quick exit, barely pausing to acknowledge his mother while perpetually talking business on his Bluetooth headset. Rounding out the quartet is younger brother Matthew (Glenn Howerton), who feels his older siblings don't take him seriously.

Needless to say, the reunion stretches out to the titular fortnight as the siblings attempt to comfort Mom and abide by her wishes to evenly divvy up the family heirlooms. James Murtaugh co-stars as Jim, Anita's second husband, whose growing annoyance with his stepchildren soon becomes something with which the audience can identify.

The characters remain undeveloped and in the cases of Keith and Barry are little more than archetypes. Poor Matthew barely registers at all. And though almost everything interesting we learn about Emily comes via her mother's interview, Nicholson makes her the film's most grounded and compelling character.

Dramatically, the movie lacks focus, unfolding in episodic spurts in which the family bickers as prologue to their coming grief. The midsection of the film must have been cut severely because there is a flurry of secondary characters (including a cameo by Clea DuVall as Matthew's obnoxious wife), whose appearances in the film have little or no dramatic value. This is both a Widescreen Presentation (1.85:1) enhanced for 16x9 TVs and a Full Screen Version and comes with the Special Features of:

Full Screen Feature
Widescreem Feature
Learning to Live Through Dying
Group Discussion Guide
Audio Commentary with Steve Stockman and Dr. Ira Byock
Deleted Scene #1 - Mother's Jewelry
Deleted Scene #2 - Leave the Video Game
Deleted Scene #3 - The To-Do List
Deleted Scene #4 - The Memorial Service

www.FoxHome.com





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