L'amie de mon mari

An unbelievable performance by Joanna Douglas! I'm blown away that this was her first flick. This is a superstar in the making. She was poised, charismatic, and stole every scene. There was not a single moment in the movie where she did not play her part without wrapping us into it. This young girl is going places *big.*

James McGowan was likewise a natural. He never once broke character, and had a compelling reason for every line and every inflection.

After seeing this, I would easily follow Douglas or McGowan in choosing other flicks to watch.

On the other hand, I was so disappointed to see what's happened with Darryl Hannah! It's hard to believe this is the same girl whom we all fell in love with in Splash. From the very first scene in which she looked kind of drugged and her hair was falling in her face, I knew she'd have trouble in this role. I can't understand why the director didn't seem to care that she consistently had tired, baggy eyes, and seemed to be squinting throughout the entire picture. Unfortunately, I never really believed any of her role, especially the scenes where she was receiving male attention. This was definitely a quite different Darryl Hannah from the earlier years.

Casting delivered two big hits and a miss on this one.

Alex has been married for 16 years to Ben. They have two children--Madison, who thinks her mom can't possibly be cool, and Luke, her younger brother. Alex works in management for a family-owned clothing manufacturer. She will now have to focus even more on her job, because Ben has quit his job to work on his book full-time.

Zoe is a cute and very attractive 24-year-old employee of Alex's business. She has been stealing from the company, but her boss is very understanding and will give Zoe a second chance. Meanwhile, Zoe's boyfriend has provocative pictures of another woman in his computer, and although he claims to care more for Zoe than the other girl, Zoe leaves him and, with her mom in rehab, ends up living in her car. Alex feels bad for her and lets her stay with her family. Big mistake: Ben works at home and he's feeling neglected by Alex. By the way, one of Alex's male co-workers is upset over his recent breakup.

The movie starts out almost as a comedy. Certainly there are plenty of comic moments early on. Joanna Douglas is so adorable as Zoe, but also quite vulnerable. Daryl Hannah still looks quite good; shame on her husband for looking at anyone else. She does a good job with the role. Her character has to go through a lot of frustration.

The predictable plot twists come too quickly, but there is good reason for that. The second half of the movie has developments that make this a little more than what might have been expected.

Theresa Joy, as the "other woman" in Zoe's life, is so hateful and has such a potty mouth, and yet somehow you have to like her, in the way people liked Alexis Colby. That has to reflect on her acting ability, especially since she's not around that much.

Deborah Odell, as Ben's "boss", looks like Kathie Lee Gifford and presents a pleasant front, sort of like someone in public relations. But she has a cold and uncaring side when Ben can't deliver his book as quickly as she wants. She's not completely evil, though.

Some sexual content is to be expected, but this is a TV-movie. I seem to recall seeing that it was edited and seeing some evidence of this, though.

I liked it.