Rating: 
Summary: A Movie That Touches On Everything Human
Review: Is it possible to touch on darn near every human experience in a 111 minute film? One wouldn't think so, but Lasse Halsstrom (director) does so with stunning clarity. The film is about Quoyle (Kevin Spacey), a man broken apart by an unsatisfying marriage to a [witch] (played excellently by Cate Blanchett). Before the marriage ends, they have a child, Bunny -- who is the highlight of her father's life -- and the mother is killed in a car accident. Coincidentally, Quoyle's "mother" and father were killed very recently, too. Enter Agnes Quoyle (Judi Dench), Quoyle's "aunt" who's heard about the death of her "nephews" parents and is there when news of the death of Bunny's mother arrives. It is clear from the outset that Agnes doesn't want to hang around, but feels compelled to when she sees her "nephew" fall apart in front of his daughter. She recommends that he and his child come with her to Newfoundland, to discover a new life for themselves.... The trouble is, is that their old life also awaits them in Newfoundland. Agnes is not -- exactly -- as she appears to be, nor is Quoyle's family. Quoyle soon discovers his family lineage: Piracy and wickedness. And he soon finds a new love interest who is just as broken as he is (Julianne Moore). A curse on their native house in Newfoundland, ghosts, a sixth-sense that some natives have (that comes alive in Quoyle's daughter, too, as the days slip past), homosexuality, incest, murder, family bonds, and a beautifully austere landscape round out much of the story. Didn't I tell you this film had it all? Well...now you'll just have to go and see it for youself! And please do. A remarkable tribute to film making. A+ rating.
Rating: 
Summary: Sail away on a tide of romance, betrayal and dark secrets
Review: In Will and Ian Ferguson's underrated masterpiece "How To Be A Canadian," there is a chapter entitled "Art and Stuff," in which they discuss Canadian literature, and in doing so identified the following elements present in "The Shipping News": incest, female character as empowered victim, graphic but ironic use of violent imagery, healing (but only at the end). This I have found true in a number of Canadian bestsellers. So how does "The Shipping News" hold up as a film in view of these dark elements? First, practically none of the actors are from Newfoundland (with the exception of the fantastic Gorden Pinsent, frequently seen on "Due South"), which is evident in the mangled accents. It gains some respectability back by being filmed on location (between Newfoundland and Nova Scotia). And the soundtrack, with five contributions from Newfoundland's own Great Big Sea, is a rollicking collection of sea chanties smoothed with guitar, tin whistles and strings during the quieter moments. However, none of the Great Big Sea songs were featured on the soundtrack CD (minus twenty points!). The story (I don't want to give too much away since the story is certainly...original) deals with R.G. Quoyle (Kevin Spacey) and his scatterbrained girlfriend Petal (Cate Blanchett). The two have a young daughter, Bunny, and after Petal's demise Quoyle and Bunny head to Newfoundland to move into their ancestral home, along with Agnis Hamm, Quoyle's aunt. The rest of the story deals (somewhat predictably) with fitting into the new community, reconciliation with the past, brushes with death and the strength of family in the face of adversity. Quoyle works on the local newspaper writing the shipping news, which he adds his own personal touch to. We meet his coworkers (Billy, Tert, Beaufield and Jack), the lovely Wavey (Julianne Moore) who runs the local daycare and her mentally challenged son Herry, who becomes Bunny's playmate (another question: who NAMED these people?!), and long lost relatives and dark family secrets. There is a bit of strong language, alcohol use, violence (including a murder), disturbing images (including rape of a minor), and a brief sex scene, which give the film its R rating. If you enjoy artsy films, beautiful scenery, an unusual yarn, or Celtic (and Newfie) music, "The Shipping News" may be for you.
Rating:
Summary: The haunting mysteries made me squirm uncomfortably
Review: Staring Kevin Spacy as Quoyle, a loser in life who works as an ink setter at a Poughkeepsie newspaper, this film is adapted from the novel by E. Annie Proulx who specializes in using macabre details in her moody and sad books. Quoyle's wife, played by Cate Blanchett, is a tramp who treats him like dirt and, when she is killed in a car crash and leaves him with their 6-year old daughter, he is an emotional wreck. That's when his aunt, played by Judi Dench enters the scene and convinces him to move back to the place of his roots, a remote village in Newfoundland where he lands a job as a reporter on the town newspaper, and falls for a local woman, Julianne Moore. This is not a simple story, however, as there are haunting mysteries everywhere, mysteries that made me squirm uncomfortably as they were uncovered. This is not a pleasant film to watch and the story, although fascinating, moved a little too slow for my taste. Clearly, the best part of the film is the outstanding performance of Kevin Spacey. I always knew he was a good actor, but this is a difficult role as we watch him transform from an emotionally damaged doormat husband into a man. Along the way there are tears and fear and terror. And the way he plays it, it all becomes real. In my opinion, he should have been nominated for an Academy Award. The setting comes alive and there was great cinematography of the harsh Newfoundland coast. The film is disturbing, as it is supposed to be, but some of the details are never explained to my satisfaction, and, at the end, there were still questions hanging. For that reason I hold off giving it a high recommendation. It is generally good filmmaking though and movie buffs will like it.
Rating:
Summary: One of the best films of the century
Review: I have been a fan of Kevin Spacey and Judi Dench for many years. And to have them in the same film is wonderful. They give believable characters life. The story has sadness, happiness, understanding, wonder and magic. The film is wonderful and anyone who enjoys a story with depth will find this film a wonderful journey of life, death and love. Bravo also to Julianne Moore and Scott Glenn.
Rating: 
Summary: "Dive beneath the surface"? If only they had...
Review: You'd think a story that includes rape, incest, parental abuse, a fatal car crash, the selling of children, and professional murder as a family tradition, might actually raise your pulse. But Robert Nelson Jacobs' screenplay is so resolutely inoffensive, and Lasse Hallstrom's direction so fatally cautious, that the film struggles to hold your attention for its scant 100 minutes as it skips playfully over all that nasty stuff in hot pursuit of a fairytale ending. Such an approach worked for these guys in "Chocolat" where the material was souffle-light, but here it's heavier and the superficiality proves fatal. This is supposed to be the story of Quoyle's transformation from exploited loser to self-determined family man with a new vision of life. But how and why does it happen? Where are the experiences that drive his inner change? What, he cheers up just because someone likes his news stories and he finds a similarly damaged girlfriend? It works in the novel, where we delve more deeply into Quoyle's character and past and come to understand him. But doing that in a film is more difficult - you can resort to dream sequences and flashbacks as this one does, but it's never really clear what these moments mean to Quoyle. Emergency explanatory voiceover is chopper-lifted in with the camera at the end, just in case you missed the point - and it's highly likely you will have. Like so many Oscar-hungry films these days, this one makes the mistake of thinking that a brilliant cast, soaring music, and a few lines of pontificating dialogue can hide an empty core. But you can't have light without darkness, you can't have growth without pain - and this film just doesn't have the nerve to go anywhere near either of them. Compare it with "American Beauty" and you'll see precisely what I mean.
Rating: 
Summary: What a pile of ship!
Review: I have to say, Kevin Spacey does a remarkable job playing Quoyle, the depressed loser. And when I say loser, I don't mean some Jason Biggs character who has a hidden personality waiting to be awakened. I'm talking about the kind of loser with no redeeming characteristics whatsoever. If you don't believe me, just watch the scene where he ineptly tries to court Julianne Moore's character by putting his head on her thigh and crying. I would feel pity for him and his childlike innocence, but he never seems to escape his role as the guy who can't do anything right. Sure, he eventually manages to earn the respect of his coworkers, but he works for a LOCAL newspaper for crying out loud! It's not like he's going to be nominated for the pulitzer prize any time soon. By the end of the film (if your head hasn't already exploded out of sheer frustration with Kevin Spacey's character) even the most conservative among us will become staunch advocates of euthanasia. And then there's the pirate theme...ugh, I can't even begin to explain how lame it is. Suffice it to say, after being haunted with images of his plundering ancestors, Quoyle decides to hack a boat to pieces along with twenty other drunks, thus confirming that he is the true descendent of a long line of God's mistakes. On the plus side, this movie would make a great public service announcement for kids to stay in school.
Rating:
Summary: Great movie
Review: Captures the sense of Newfoundland. Those who went to see this in the theater with me were awed.
Rating:
Summary: A Beautiful, Gentle GEM!!
Review: Kevin Spacey first snapped my attention as Mel Proffit on the CBS telly series WISEGUY. He played a drug dealing, jet-setting, psycho that went around killing people, freaking out and saying things like "only the toes knows...". Well, if the toes knew, they must have know what a big star Spacey would be in just a few years. He choses films that stretch his untouchable range in the Usual Suspects, the serial killer in 7, the gentle soul claiming to be an alien in the wonderfully moving K-Pax to this gem of a film The Shipping News. This was a gentle, loving, heart-lifting book, so I feared when it came to the screen, all the quirkiness that made it so special might be lost. Instead, it is beautiful realised under Spacey brilliant performance, backed by the ever eternal and radiant Juliana Moore and the utterly marvellous Judy Dench and the solid Pete Postlethwaite, and another super tour de force for the ever solid Scott Glen. This is a story that touches your heart, the way so many of Hollywood films fail to do, and leave you smiling at the end, and maybe even leaves you missing these near friends you have come to love. It is good to see films like that do so well, just a shame there is not more. It is brilliantly written, with all the quirkiness you find in a small knit community, the isolation tend to make the locals revel in their bizarre personalities and even sort of wear them like a badge. I have seen this same 'wee tight isle' in Scotland and in Ireland and small towns in the US. Everyone knows everyone - knows the history as far back as it goes. The past is not so distant, where people with the sight is just an everyday occurrence. Kevin Spacey plays a gentle soul, driven by an overbearing, likely abusive father to believing he was nothing. He felt the world pasted him by until Petal jumped into his car. Petal is typical Hussy type, a lass out for fun and little else. For the first time, Kevin's character feels that he no invisible. Petal gets pregnant, have a baby girl, Bunny, and then precedes to live life just as she always had, with good time guys and honky-tonks. She checks in long enough to upset Spacey, and pat the kid on the head. When the child is about 8, she slips away with child in tow, running away with the latest boyfriend. If that is not upsetting enough, Spacey's father and mother decided life is the pits and check out. In the midst of finding out Petal died in a car crash with her boyfriend, but sold Bunny to a black-market child adoption ring for six thousand dollars, Spacey's long lost aunt,(Dench) turns up to steal her brothers ashes. (Won't reveal what she does with them!! She encourages Spacey to take his daughter and move back to New Foundland to where his family comes from. Once there his daughter shows tendencies of 'the sight' but it is taken in stride. Scott Glen owns the local paper and hired Spacey to write the shipping news. He fears failure in this, since Petal just reinforced his worthlessness instilled by his father. However, instead, he comes into his own. He also begins a tentative romance with Moore, with his daughter taking to her son, who suffered brain damage during birth. Spacey faces his demons and learns to heal, as Dench confronts her own secrets and shames, and loves to move on. The scenery is gorgeous, raining and foggy ( sorry I am a Scot and love a bit of the wet and fog makes me want to walk in it forever. This captures the moodiness, though the snow in May does make one shudder!) This is just one beautiful movie. You cannot say anything higher.
Rating: 
Summary: The Shipping News
Review: My two most vivid emotions while watching this movie were these: a sigh of relief when Cate Blanchett left the screen and a strong conviction that I never so much as want to set foot in Newfoundland. The character of Cate Blanchett was ugly and hateful. I was just so happy I wasn't going to have to look at her for the rest of the movie. The landscape of Newfoundland struck me as an instant dose of depression. I really want to like Kevin Spacey, but he just never came to life in this film. Judi Dench seemed wasted. This movie probably seemed as good as it did to me by contrast with the other one I watched the same day, Minority Report, a real stinker.
Rating:
Summary: Must see movie
Review: The Shipping News is one of the must see movies of 2002. It has slipped rather quietly into the theatres and DVD stores but don't be put off by this lack of fanfare. A solid cast do credit to this Pulitzer Prize winning novel. Actors such as Spacey and Dench are now so dependable that I will watch any movie with which either are associated with confidence. Moore also finally gets a role that allows her to shine. The scenery is spectacular and the subject matter thought-provoking. The snappy dialogue and chemistry bewteen the chief protagonists contribute to a great viewing package. Two thumbs up!
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