Stepmom

With a bland and unrevealing title like Stepmom, you might half expect a horror film about the mad matriarch of a dysfunctional family. That's not the case here. Rather, Stepmom is another a long tradition of three-hankie weepies, and a rather archetypical one at that. Luckily, this tearjerking comedy-drama compensates for its familiar structure with several superior performances. Luke and Jackie Harrison (Ed Harris and Susan Sarandon) have been divorced now for two years. They …

…to a few short months. This dramatic shortcut does serve to heighten the emotional shocks of the film (the impacts are all felt sooner than they should be), but at the cost of realism. After the end of Stepmom, you feel like a finely wrung sponge. The film may be completely by-the-book, but thanks to the performances at its center, its emotional manipulation succeeds. This may be a formulaic tearjerker, but it's one done well.