Review of Please Give (2010) by Corey W — 31 Dec 2010

Its a nice little lesson-movie. It has moral to it, but in the end I feel like nothing really tied together. A lot of questions about what happened with these charatters surfaced me as I walked out of this. I mean, I haven't even heard of this film until the day of. My aunt told me to come with her to the Plymouth Plantation to watch an indie film being shown. I never even got the chance to watch the trailer or know what this was about. I mean, the movie doesn't really have much of a plot.

[MAY CONTAIN SOME SPOILERS].

The movie pretty much just focuses on the lives of a wife, husband, and daughter and two sisters and their grandmother who both live next door to each other in an apartment complex. Kate, her husband, and her teenage daughter look forward to the death of the Grandmother so they can make their apartment much bigger. But, one of the two sisters does whatever possible to keep her grandmother in healthy condition, while the other sister just doesn't care since she thinks her grandmother is a "bitch". The connections between these characters grow as the movie progresses and more and more drama piles up onto a table as well. It could be classified as a no-plotted "Chick-Flick".

Kate is the type of character who believes that money shouldn't go towards anything un-important. Well, thats not what her teenage daughter thinks. Her daughter wants nothing but expensive jeans and facials, but Kate believes money should go towards a better cause' like the homeless. There's one soapy problem in the movie that goes along during the film. Kate also runs a furniture store of old things that are "valuable". She takes such things and pretty much just puts price tags on them. She also faces the problem of people coming in and out of the store asking "Where'd you get this?". Kate wonders troughout the movie if other stores are going after her.

Alex is Kate's husband. Alex loves his family, but once he meets Mary, one of the two sisters [the one who thinks her Grandmother is a "Bitch"], and sorta-er falls in love. When Alex goes to get a "facial" at Mary's job, the two start an affair and Alex has trouble ending it. Mary is just the type of character who doesn't care and stalks her EX'S new girlfriends. Lets put it this way...she's a bitch. Another soapy problem.

Rebecca Hall plays Rebecca. The other sister who takes care of her Grandmother. Rebecca is so caught up in work and her grandmother that she doesn't date. Her job is giving mamograms, by the way. Her character meets a man and sorta begins a relationship. But, can she handle taking care of her grandmother and a new relationship? Soapy problem number four.

The soapy problems between all these characters piles up more and more as the movie goes on and makes the veiwers wonder: what the hell is the plot of this movie?

The reason I rated this movie so high is because of its performences and for its good dialouge. The story was too flat and there wasn't much to be found from it.

Catherine Keener and Rebecca Hall give wonderful performences in this movie, maybe even Oscar-worthy. Amanda Peet is drop-dead gorgeous in this movie, not like that makes her performence good, but based on that, I thought she was rather good. Normally, I only find her role's okay, but in this movie I seemed to really like her. She wasn't as amazing as Keener or Hall, but still, quite good.

The film's writing is rather good and the dialouge works perfectly.

This would've been a much better movie if it had two things. One: A plot. I wanted a story from this. As the movie progresses these characters have life problems and such in which they try to solve but the movie never really has a plot to give us a point. Two: A better ending. I feel as if the movie didn't end. It just cut. The movie ends with me wondering a few things and I feel like this wasn't tied up the way it should have been. With a better ending i'd give this a higher rating.

Anyways, this is a nicley acted indie-flick. Sure, the plot is somewhere hidden, but it has a nice moral about life. Rent it.