Two women on two different parts of the world, and both dealing with crises in their lives, decide to take a breather from the situations they are facing, and swap houses. Thus, Marilyn, an American woman who is grieving after the tragic death of her son, goes to Dublin, to the Tara Road house of Ria, who gets the Connecticut house of the Yankee woman. This premise, which is the basis of Maeve Binchy's novel, seems to be almost the same plot of the recent film "The Vacation" in which a similar situation takes place.
Unfortunately, the material written for the screen, doesn't add anything new. In fact, this is a film full of stereotypes on both sides of the Atlantic. Not having read the original work, one can't really say what went wrong, but based on the thin screen play of the movie, one loses all kind of interest in what is presented. Director Gillies McKinnon has done better movies before. Alas, this one will not add anything to his CV.
The best thing in "Tara Road" is Olivia Williams, an fine young actress who seems to be above and beyond what she is being asked to do. Andie MacDowell casts a gloomy aura in her portrayal of Marilyn. Fine actors are completely wasted, as is the case with Brenda Fricker, Stephen Rea, the young and beautiful Sarah Bolger, who we admired for her work in "In America".
As soap operas go, this film will, no doubt, appeal to a certain type of movie goer. Thankfully we didn't have to pay for it since it was shown on cable, recently.
