Indigestible

Married Life

Crit

How do I not believe this movie? Let me count the ways:

1. I don't believe that any sensible heterosexual man could ever prefer Rachel McAdams to My Future Wife Patricia Clarkson, particularly Rachel McAdams in that awful ultrablond hair, particularly not when we're told early on that Clarkson's conveniently named Pat is interested in lots and lots and lots of marital sex.
2. I don't believe that any character played by Pierce Brosnan in any film would ever ask for "whiskey" rather than for Scotch or Irish or even bourbon, this one being set in America (though not, I gather from the title, the novel on which it's based, Five Roundabouts to Heaven).
3. I don't believe that any character played by Pierce Brosnan in any film would ever turn down an offered whiskey.
4. I don't believe in a world that holds two noncretinous women who would fall in love with the thoroughly unattractive character played by Chris Cooper.
5. I don't believe that someone as good as Cooper (or, for that matter, Clarkson or Brosnan) couldn't find some better use of his time and talent; there are a thousand actors in Hollywood who could have done this just as unbelievably.
6. But mostly I don't believe in any human psychology that could accept the logic "I must kill my wife to spare her the pain she'd suffer if I left her." I don't know: maybe the Coens could get away with such an absurdity by creating an absurd universe we could believe in for 100 minutes, but it doesn't come close to working here. I mean, we've all wanted to kill a partner (haven't we? hey, come on, don't leave me hanging here . . . ), but only after we've begun to hate him or her; none of us has ever contemplated killing a partner we still actually like (have we? . . . ).

On the other hand, give the setbuilders in British Columbia credit for great interior shots of the Cloud Room and the lobby of the Chrysler Building: there is virtually nothing else in the film that says "New York"--they apparently couldn't afford enough 1949 cars for a street scene, and even the Cooper character's high-floor office has only a generic city view--but they busted their ass on the Chrysler interiors, including the elevators and elevator doors.

Trailers

• Then She Found Me--Not counting a few episodes of Mad About You, Helen Hunt's writing, producing, and directing debut. I've always liked Helen Hunt, sometimes in spite of herself, so I wish her well, but the trailer looked very much from the Nora playbook.

• Son of Rambow--First saw the trailer for this last Saturday at the Angelika, but in writing down titles in a notebook in the dark, I overwrite this one. Could be seriously mawkish, but you gotta love the notion of kids making a movie on their own--sort of a lower-budget Be Kind Rewind.