Herald rating: * * *
Running time: 129 mins
Rental: From today
Review: Ewan McDonald
Dr Homer Larch (Michael Caine) runs St Cloud's orphanage in Maine in the 30s and 40s with a conscience (and an accent that veers from the East Coast to the East End, but we won't dwell on that).
If
he believes the circumstances are appropriate, Larch also provides abortions. Loved by his staff and the orphans, he all but adopts one baby, Homer Wells (Tobey Maguire), teaching him medicine and grooming him to take over the orphanage.
Candy (Charlize Theron) and her boyfriend Wally (Paul Rudd) arrive at St Cloud's for an abortion. Homer becomes their friend and follows them to Wally's family farm, where he joins an apple-picking crew headed by Mr Rose (Delroy Lindo) and including his daughter Rose Rose (Erykah Badu), falling in love with Candy when Wally goes back to the war.
When he finds Rose is a victim of incest, Homer must decide whether to offer her an abortion. He must decide where his future lies.
The story, adapted by John Irving from his novel and directed by Lasse Hallstrom (My Life As A Dog, What's Eating Gilbert Grape), unfolds gently, with Maguire's cool, almost detached performance at the centre and Caine's Oscar-winning disintegration as Larch on the sidelines.
It might be an unusual word to use about a film that dwells on these themes, but this is a sweet movie, more European than American, a better collection of episodes than a fully realised story.
