This picture could have been excellent if it weren't for the script and director.
Cleaverville's plot line read like a soap opera with a gorgeous scam artist Grace drugging a "bad guy" and ending up with a bag of diamonds that she didn't expect to find. It turns out the diamonds belong to a mafioso"Godmother". With nowhere else to turn, Grace heads home to her mother Kay's house. But, there's no love to be found there. Of course living with Kay is her grand-daughter Laura and across the street is Laura's father thrown into the mix. You get the drift. One big dysfunctional family.
While I can handle and enjoy hokey, the truly hokey parts made me cringe. The dialogue in these parts were awful, direct, and handled poorly by the director. You can blame him for most of what's wrong with this picture. The acting was exceptional for such a semi-poorly written screenplay. They were so close to having a gold product. But, allowed the script to get in the way. While shooting each scene, if the director had thought about how it would look on screen, he would have changed some of the awful dialogue into something not so cheesy. It's not that hard if you think and plan ahead.
A prime example is the very last line the Mafioso "Godmother" says. It's one of the worst pieces of dialogue a writer could come up with. It's dialogue like this, that ruins the excellent banter between these characters.
There were also plot points that were either quickly glossed over or ignored.
Grace's drug problem was a major one. I might have missed the one piece of dialogue that said she was clean. But, for someone who was absent for 16 years because of this, there wasn't a moment of her looking, taking or thinking about getting high. She did sniffle a few times, which brought glances from her mother.
Laura first comes off as being a Saintly young lady who is an A student. But, she's almost as crooked as everyone else in this movie. Her best friend/someday boyfriend conveniently makes all the phony ID needed in their Catholic High School. Grace of course needs new ID.
Kay has her own set of problems. While you can understand why Grace turned out the way she did. Kay turned over a new leaf with Laura. So, Laura turning out "bad" is unbelievable. Laura should be a Saint.
Even with the myriad of problems this script has, it was still an enjoyable movie. It just could have been a multiple viewing type movie.
