Herald rating: * * *
Running time: 98 mins
Rental: Today, Video Ezy only
Review: Ewan McDonald
Won't be seeing it on the networks for some time yet, this TV-movie for which Vanessa Redgrave won the Golden Globe last week, but the Video Ezy chain has nipped in and has it on the shelves.
It's
a trio of stories set in 1961, 1972, and 2000, each about a lesbian relationship, all set in the same house.
The first segment, by far the best, reflects its times as it features a heartbreaking performance by Redgrave as Edith, a senior citizen mourning the loss of her longtime partner, Abby (Marian Seldes).
Abby's nephew (Paul Giamatti) and his wife (Elizabeth Perkins) visit Edith, fail to recognise the women's relationship and treat Edith as a friend who happens to live in a house that now belongs to them.
In 1972 Chloe Sevigny (Boys Don't Cry) plays a butch motorcycle rider who falls in love at first sight with Dawson's Creek's Michelle Williams, a student living with three gay flatmates. Its theme is gender identity and picking on minorities.
The 2000 segment features Sharon Stone as free-spirit Fran, who is trying to get pregnant with the support of her partner, DeGeneres' Kal. There are poignant overtones here: the episode was written and directed by DeGeneres' then-partner, Anne Heche.
As far as it was written, that is; it's largely improvised and mainly silly, the weakest of the three stories.
