Walk on the Moon, A Review

It`s the summer of 1969, the year that man first walked on the moon. It was a dangerous expedition and so is the one that Pearl Kantrowitz ( Diane Lane) is about to embark on. She married Marty (Liev Schreiber) when she was 17 and she`s now the mother of teenage Alison (Anna Paquin) and Danny (Bobby Boriello). The women and the kids are packed off to summer camp while many of the husbands stay in the city to work. It`s almost a cliche that Pearl falls in love with a travelling salesman - he`s the blouse man, Walker Jerome (Viggo Mortensen)... and with him she discovers all the things she feels she`s been missing out on in life... This is such a lovely, romantic, sexy movie, full of compassion and humour... potentially a banal soap the whole thing is distinguished by an honest script, a screenwriting debut by Pamela Gray and performances of such integrity that it`s heartwrenching. Diane Lane is just beautiful as Pearl, you feel for her every moment. Viggo Mortensen is truly charismatic but the one who absolutely sealed my opinion of this film was Tovah Feldshuh who plays Pearl`s mother-in-law Lilian. Her character could have been so easily over the top but she keeps it in check beautifully. The director was the actor Tony Goldwyn, grandson of the famous Sam, making his screen debut behind the camera and while there are no visual pyrotechnics in this, his direction matches the tenor and honesty of the material. It`s so nice to fall in love with a film the way I did with A Walk on the Moon. David`s Comments:Very well acted by all concerned, this is more of a telemovie than a theatrical experience. Though the basic situation is almost agonisingly real, the film is less convincing when it tries to recreate Woodstock - having the daughter spot her mother in "that" crowd begs belief.