Review of Reservation Road (2007) by David S — 26 Nov 2008

Premise was good and I would probably watch it again only to see if I missed some things that I thought could have been explained better.

The fact that Mark Ruffolo's time with his son seemed to be something he had just "earned", his partner treated him like he was the biggest *f* off in Conn and his ex was worried sick every time he took the boy. If they said something about why this "slacker attorney" had screwed up so bad, I missed it. The other was the music teacher (his ex) - it took a few scenes for it to dawn on me that the screaming mother in the driveway scene was the same person as the smiling, helpful music teacher. What??? Another reason why we needed to know what Ruffolo did that was so "evil". I thought Joaquin Phoenix over-acted and looked ridiculous at times. Jennifer Connelly was strong and so was Mark Ruffolo, there was just no character definement for him. Who was he?

Hard to watch at times, the worst nightmare any parent could ever envision.

Just when you're ready to reach for the Kleenex, Joaquin goes postal ruining the moment.