![]() “God, it was great to play a guy like him, gone to seed, surly. But seeing Lopez, whom he blames for the tragedy, opens old wounds. He had finally begun to live with his son’s death in a car accident 12 years before. He plays an embittered Wyoming rancher who spends his days cutting brush and looking after his former horse wrangler and best friend, played by Morgan Freeman, an invalid after being mauled by a bear.īut the rancher’s life changes dramatically with the arrival of his dead son’s former wife, played by Jennifer Lopez, and an 11-year-old granddaughter he never knew he had. “An Unfinished Life” is easily Redford’s best film since 1998’s “The Horse Whisperer” and the first to see him truly accepting, if not altogether embracing, his 68 years. “It could make me crazy if I let it,” he says. The Weinsteins were allowed to shepherd their remaining films to market, but as Redford observes, some are being shepherded with more guidance than others. To Redford’s “enormous frustration,” it has been on the shelf for more than two years amid a battle between Bob and Harvey Weinstein, the departing founders of film distributor Miramax, and its corporate parent, the Walt Disney Co. “Then comes the musical chairs, the constant changes in leadership, and it all happens again,” he says.Ĭorporate politics also have affected Redford’s new film, “An Unfinished Life,” which opens in theaters today. ![]() A change of leadership, Redford says, has made for a better atmosphere, but he wants to be free to be “more aggressive” – as in broadcasting last year’s “Vote for Change” concerts, an idea Viacom thought unwise. More and more of the movies that screen every January at the Park City, Utah, festival, which Redford took over more than 20 years ago, now find their way to TV screens.īut Sundance’s partnership with Viacom faltered in the last few years. The business concerned the Sundance Channel, the cable network that Redford said was designed to bring the festival to people who can’t go. ![]() “I had to do some business with corporate America,” he says. From Butch Cassidy And The Sundance Kid to An Unfinished Life, Redford has always delivered the great one-liner with deft nonchalance and he is on form here again and, with the added presence of Freeman, gives the proceedings both gravitas and much-needed levity but it is too little, too late.Robert Redford has had to postpone his morning interview, and when he does check in with apologies, he reports the reason with some wariness. Jean, although the catalyst, is made redundant once they hit the ranch because the movie is really about the relationship between granddaughter and grandfather - something Hallstrom has forgotten. We have seen Jean played so many times before and Lopez brings absolutely nothing new or original to the role. Every time Lopez appears on screen, she sinks the whole ship it's not just her acting abilities (which are not up to scratch), it's her character. When you take a glance at Lopez's previous outings (Monster In Law, Jersey Girl, Maid In Manhattan, The Wedding Planner, Enough, Gigli) it's obvious she needed a hit, and fast, and signing on to a project which stars two heavyweight actors in Redford and Freeman looked like a smart move - think again. His leading lady didn't help much either. As Jean takes a job in a local cafe, Einar and Griff set about building a relationship with the help of crippled farmhand Mitch (Freeman).However, the threat of Jean's boyfriend turning up hangs heavily in the air.Īn Unfinished Life falls down between two stools as it tries to cater to the type of film my father likes (the great outdoors, Robert Redford) with the type of movie my mother likes (a woman wronged, Robert Redford).Director Hallstrom aims for, and succeeds in delivering, a bittersweet tale but in keeping the bitter as far from the sweet as possible, he ends up with two movies hopelessly strung together. ![]() ![]() Things are frosty between Jean and Einar because he blames her for the death of his son who died in a car accident years before. After suffering for too long at the hands (and fists) of her violent boyfriend, Jean Gilkyson (Lopez) flees with her 11-year-old daughter Griff (Becca Gardner) to her estranged father-in-law Einar's (Redford) dilapidated ranch. ![]()
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