| The Weight of Water | 
 enlarge | Director: Kathryn Bigelow
Actors: Catherine Mccormack, Sean Penn, Sarah Polley, Elizabeth Hurley, Josh Lucas
Studio: Lions Gate
Category: DVD
List Price: $14.98
Buy Used: $2.03
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Avg. Customer Rating:  33 reviews
Sales Rank: 40097
Format: Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, Dvd-video, Subtitled, Widescreen, Ntsc
Languages: English (Original Language), English (Subtitled), Spanish (Subtitled)
Rating: R (Restricted)
Number Of Items: 1
Running Time: 113
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.2
Dimensions (in): 7.1 x 5.4 x 0.6
MPN: LGED71429D
ISBN: 1589712900
UPC: 658149809727
EAN: 9781589712904
ASIN: B0000844LU
Theatrical Release Date: 2000
Release Date: March 4, 2003
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Condition: Use in very Good Condition, Don't hesitate to contact us if you have any problems or concerns about your order, We will resolve it ASAP!!!
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Product Description
Studio: Lions Gate Home Ent. Release Date: 04/27/2004
Amazon.com
This complicated mystery, directed with passionate intensity by Katherine Bigelow (Near Dark), deserves better than the paltry distribution it received in theaters. Granted, it's a tough sell: a contrast between the emotional unrest in a group of modern travelers and a hundred-year-old murder case on a desolate New England island. A photographer (Catherine McCormack) is researching the old case, and we flip back and forth between time periods as she uncovers new clues. The parallel-story structure is often tricky to pull off in movies, and Bigelow, working from the Anita Shreve novel, doesn't entirely solve it here. But the old mystery, set in a strict Norwegian community, is compelling, and the cast is stronger than the material: Sarah Polley and the late Katrin Cartlidge are stand-outs in the 1873 scenes, and Sean Penn (believably insufferable) and Elizabeth Hurley flirt naughtily in the modern. --Robert Horton
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| Customer Reviews: Read 28 more reviews...
 Nice Movie September 30, 2008
I loved this move, I saw it on-demand and I must have watched it everyday. I finally decided to purchase it, and this was the cheapest price. Believe it or not, this is a true story.
The Book is Better - I agree with another reviewer March 2, 2008
This film has a talented cast but the beauty of this story within a story is that it is a prequel to Anita Shreve's The Last Time They Met. The story has potential that just doesn't translate well into film. Partly because Shreve is a master storyteller whose prose is very strong on subtext and context. Best to read the book then watch the movie of love loss betrayal and affairs that never die. Penn does a great job of brining the brooding poet Thomas Jane to life.
Weighty, and Watery. Great Moments Better Than Whole. January 15, 2008
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
This film tells two stories. The first, a murder mystery occurring in what appears to be 19th century New England in an immigrant community. The second, the story of two couples - brothers played by Sean Penn and Josh Lucas with, respectively wife (Catherine McCormack) and girlfriend (Elizabeth Hurley) - on a short holiday somewhat casually investigating the matter as they sail around the locale. The timelines are well demarcated cinematically through color and sound (with a couple of odd cuts), and this film will appeal to fans of the neo-noir/mystery genre, as well as folks who like to watch Elizabeth Hurley walk around barely clad. There are some interesting relationships between the past and present storylines, well-filmed parallel stormy crescendos, and some worthy dialogue (such as the extended conversation between McCormake and Hurley about Penn's character).
I liked Mccormack as Penn's troubled photographer wife. She and Ciaran Hinds as the creepy accused murderer in the flashbacks were the bright spots in this film for me. Sarah Polley put in a typically good effort as a gray, twisted, perpetually disappointed young bride in a hard new world. Hurley was hired to ooze naughtiness in this film, and that's what she did by sucking and nibbling on every small object at hand and stroking herself so much that I'd have expected a related rash or friction burn. Was Penn's character an ogling, self-obsessed, unlikeable poet or a grand, tortured poet-soul? "Talent excuses cruelty." Josh Lucas just sort of handsomely floated around the periphery of the troubled threesome for most of the film, and Vinissa Shaw floated through the middle of the earlier timeline as Polley's naive and very sweet sister-in-law.
In the end, there were lots of moments that I liked, but the whole thing left me with a few unscratched itches and that feeling that, like a few of the characters, I'd been quickly diddled and then left alone.
...and Liz Hurley Sucking Provocatively on Everything. January 9, 2008
2 out of 3 found this review helpful
This movie should have been titled "The Weight of Water... and Liz Hurley Sucking Provocatively on Everything."
As an Anita Shreve fan (this film was based on her book, which was a fabulous read BTW), I approached it with one of those "the movies are never as good as the book" attitudes.
I was partially wrong. In some ways, it eclipsed the book and in others, it fell short. The eclipsing parts make up for the shortcomings and so it is a film I'd recommend to a select type of audience, particularly, those who appreciate very artistic types of films.
Anyway there were only a couple of things I found disagreeable. The original story (the "present tense" part of the story) had Thomas and Jean's 5 y/o daughter on the boat, which I thought was a key element in the tensions that played out, but the screen play left the daughter at home w/relatives.
Secondly, while Elizabeth Hurley's character, Adelaide, is supposed to be a sexy vixen hung up on Sean Penn's character of Thomas and is a threatening presence to Jean, her part was a little "over played."
Could you see yourself on a boat w/your husband, brother in law and his gorgeous GF who's publicly announced her awe for your husband's work (as a poet), and every time you turn around, she's sucking provocatively on a piece of ice in the hot sun in a bikini, or sucking provocatively on alaskan king crab legs at dinner, or sucking provocatively on the pickup sticks during a game, or sucking provocatively on the swizzle stick from her drink - each time always making direct eye contact w/your husband.
Do you get my point then, that in this film, Liz Hurley's manner of getting her character across is by sucking on everything? And it's annoying?
However... the film is brilliant in other ways. It splits between the present and the events surrounding an 1800s murder involving Norwegian emmigrants living on an island near New Hampshire. Jean is on assignment w/her magazine to shoot some photos to accompany an article to be written about the murders. They try to mix business w/pleasure by going on a "couples cruise" for several days on the bro in law's boat.
Sexual tensions, implied infidelity, all this brooding stuff going on on the boat with intermittent scenes going back to the events surrounding the murders in the 1800s, to which there are many parallels (unhappy marriages, isolation, infidelity, etc.).
That's were the film's brilliance shows and the actors really shine. Ciaran Hinds is great as the wrongly accused and Sarah Polley is stunning in her role as Maren Hondvedt, the sole survivor of the murders (and I won't give away the plot as to what else she ends up being...).
It's a good film. If you're a guy, Liz Hurley sucking provocatively on small props should be a bonus and if you never read the book, you'd never care that the daughter isn't on the boat.
I'd recommend to friends who like artistic films.
 I am totally shattered by Sarah Polley's performance here... December 13, 2007
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
Say what you want about this movie...structurally, story-telling-wise, or even about its entire modern day arc. I am putting the performance Sarah Polley gives here in my all-time greats pantheon. This, my friends, is an actress to be reckoned with.
I have yet to read Anita Shreve's book. I will be after watching this movie. And while I usually prefer the written word to film adaptations, I am fearful that there will be nothing on the page that will be able to hold a candle to the fierce and wounded performance of Ms. Polley.
As Maren, Sarah Polley--more than any other actress or actor I have ever seen--captures our universal and very human need for love. Even more brilliant: she does this from moment one of the performance but conceals it until a pivotal moment later in the movie. She has, through her performance, truly breathed life into this character.
Through most of the movie she alternates between a relatively to extremely unlikable character. Yet when she arrives at her weakest moment, at what some might argue is her most vile moment, I found her totally sympathetic and heart-breaking.
This is acting that gives us a true glimpse into a character. By extension it lets us more clearly see ourselves.
While there are things about this movie that I do not care for (I really don't care all that much for anyone on the boat except maybe the brother...hence the four stars), there is no performance that I could ever recommend more highly than the one Sarah Polley turns in here. You owe it to yourself to see this.
I am in awe of and totally shattered by Maren.
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