“Baby don’t you cry, gonna make a pie, gonna make a pie with a heart in the middle.”

Plot Summary: An unhappily married small-town waitress/pie-maker (Keri Russell) yearns for a better life.

Review:

I had never seen any of Shelly’s previous directorial efforts and the only reason I saw this one was probably due to the publicity it received in the wake of her murder. Frankly, I wasn’t expecting much, but to my surprise I quite enjoyed Waitress, even though it’s impossible to watch it without thinking about Shelly’s tragic death, especially if you’re familiar with her ‘90s work with director Hal Hartley. Keri Russell stars as Jenna, an unhappy, unfulfilled waitress trapped in a hellish marriage to a possessive, controlling chauvinist named Earl. Jenna finds some solace in her friendships with coworkers Becky (Cheryl Hines) and Dawn (Shelly) - the three of whom appear to be the respective counterparts to Alice, Flo, and Vera from Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore (and its television spin-off Alice) - but only when baking pies does she enjoy complete deliverance from her troubles. Making pies is Jenna’s bliss, and she dreams about using the prize money from an upcoming pie-baking contest to start a new life. But how can she follow her bliss with Earl in the way? And then there’s the little matter of her unexpected, and wholly unwelcome pregnancy, which promises to squash her pie-in-the-sky hopes once and for all. To further complicate matters she has a fling with her married OB-GYN.

If that all sounds like the stuff of sitcoms and nighttime soaps, well, to a certain extent it is, particularly the amusing but clichéd scenes in which Jenna and the hunky doctor’s passion for each other erupts at inappropriate times and places. Moreover, the film’s tone veers unevenly between quirky comedy and light drama, while many of the characters, especially the Neanderthal Earl, seem more like caricatures than real people (which somehow makes Earl’s physical abuse of Jenna doubly unpleasant). Despite these shortcomings, however, Waitress remains a worthwhile diversion thanks to snappy dialogue, fast pacing and especially Russell’s outstanding performance, which is the strong thread that holds this otherwise flimsy material together. Fully committing herself to the performance, Russell is funny when delivering her sassy dialogue, sympathetic when putting up with Earl, sexy when rekindling her romantic passions with the hunky doctor, and delightful when concocting new pies (such as her Earl Murders Me Because I’m Having An Affair Pie, which calls for smashing blackberries and raspberries into a chocolate crust!). Though predictable and contrived, the crowd-pleasing fairy-tale ending, in which Jenna triumphantly tells off Earl, poignantly discovers a belated capacity for mother love, and fulfills her wildest pie-related dreams, is hard to resist. We’re happy that Jenna gets to have her pie, eat it, and throw it in Earl’s face too.

Note: Russell received a Best Actress nomination at this year’s NOFF Awards

Posted on March 11th, 2008 by Mat Viola
Filed under: Reviews