here is a wonderful film that should have been written and directed by the coen brothers or by carl franklin. god, if only. instead of being one of the greatest
quirky black comedies it ends up a distant second to 'drowning mona'. the best thing you can say for 'nurse betty' is that there is no movie anything like it, and
that rene zellweger has given the performance of her life.
this film is as appealingly daft and disconcertingly magnetic as its protagonist. it has a miraculous, almost innocent yet brazen compulsion as is bumbles
forward. and somehow it manages to get you to suspend disbelief and genuinely wonder what will happen next. i suppose that is the magic of the film, which
handles a fairly standard naif stalked by hitman plot uniquely.
in this case the hitman is the oddly cast duo of morgan freeman and chris rock, neither of whom seem to be acting much, although they deliver the films best
lines. on the other hand, maybe it's just that chris rock is generally incapable of being anyone other than chris rock - and every moment he succeeds in acting
you wish he would just be chris rock. fortunately for all, he does better chris rock here than in 'dogma'.
i spent half the flick trying to remember how i know greg kinnear and why anyone would find him remotely appealing. then i gave up and realized that betty
was truly delusional, at which point i shake my head smiling and say, 'well, you go girl'. incidently, half of the vignettes in betty's journey are exactly of this
nature as she embarks upon her mad pursuit of love and enlists a not-quite-motely-enough-to-be-coen-material crew in support.
