Film Reviews

The Upside of Anger

• Rating:
• Director: Mike Binder
• Starring: Evan Rachel Wood
• Details: US / 118mins (15A).

Costner has this baseball guy thing down, hasn't he? Bull Durham, Field Of Dreams and For The Love Of The Game all showed that he can do the washed up player with aplomb. The Upside Of Anger sees Costner play the friendly Denny Davies, a once-great baseball star-turned-DJ who lives next door to sharp-tongued suburban wife Terry Ann Wolfmeyer (Allen). Terry's husband has just disappeared and left her with four daughters (among them the growing-in-stature Wood) who struggle with their mother's romantic dilemmas as well as their own. Costner allows Allen take centre stage in this drama of a family in transition as he realises that it's not his story this time around - it's hers. Allen has consistently proved what a fine actor she is over the years and this, her first chance to step into the limelight, just may sway producers to cast her in more leading roles instead of being the dependable character actor she's built a reputation on. It's not all Allen as her daughters - Keri Russell, Alicia Witt, Wood and Christensen - all have their little subplots that deal with Allen's disintegration and absence of their father in their own little ways. What's most pleasing about their believable side-stories is that they include a high school crush and a pregnancy without tipping over into cliche even though we're never in doubt how it will all turn out. Recommended to those who are fed up with the teen comedies or anything by Nancy Meyers and Richard Curtis.

Review by Gavin Burke