January 16, 2007

Picture suburbia and all its trappings. A tight knit community, families trying to impress (and judge) one another and of course the one's who are unhappy/bored with their lives wishing things would be different. This is the setting for the movie Little Children featuring Kate Winslet, Jennifer Connelly and Patrick Wilson.

Sarah (Winslet) is bored with her life. She's annoyed by the daily routine she has to follow because she's a mother and it's what's expected. Motherhood doesn't seem natural for her and she's also stuck in a loveless marriage. All this disconnect ends when she meets Brad (Wilson) who's Kathy's (Connelly) husband. Brad's also dissatisfied with his life. Although he loves his wife, their marriage isn't perfect either. He's seen as a failure because he can't seem to pass the bar exam. Also, all the attention around the house is given to their son. This automatically cancels him out of the affection equation.

As Sarah and Brad seem to find in each other what they were missing, leaving the door to potential chaos wide open, there's a parrallel unstable situation affecting this perfect neighborhood. Ronnie (Jackie Earle Haley), a convicted sex offender, moved into town. Everyone's up in arms about it and Larry (Noah Emmerich), the unhinged retired cop, makes it his mission to "protect" the town by intimitating him. Then in one night, everyone realizes what's most important and stability is regained.

Little Children was an interesting movie to watch. Ever so often a narrator's voice would come on and it sort of gave it this documentary feel. It was as if you were peeking into and allowed to see these people's lives. The Ronnie character made my skin crawl, so Haley did a good job. Good movie.

IMDB: Little Children