While this movie's finest moments could be described, with slight exaggeration, as amusing, its weaker moments are dull, confusing, contrived, and arbitrary. Expected a comedy, so the slow and meandering beginning threw me off. The middle portion of the film succeeds somewhat, in that is derives a few chuckles and keeps you watching to see what happens. The ending, however, completely disappoints: distant (and hard to believe) familial connections emerge between major characters, and Glenn Close's fate seems overly tragic within the relaxed, droll environment of the movie. These elements just aren't handled well, and don't particularly add anything to the story, although you get the feeling they're supposed to. This brings me to the performances. Charles S. Dutton has a much larger role than he deserves...he plays a lifelong resident of a small southern town, but looks like he just walked out of a department store in Fresno and was handed a fishing rod. And he has very limited charisma here, too. As for Glenn Close, she's pretty good, but I'm simply tired of her disturbed, pretentious characters and her histrionics. The bright spots here are Julianne Moore and Chris O'Donnell, but unfortunately their roles are somewhat superfluous and not central to the plot. COOKIE'S FORTUNE is good for a few mild laughs, and the chance to see Lyle Lovett onscreen (however briefly), but little else.
Review of Cookie's Fortune
