I just watched the trailer:

This film seems like it will be addressing so many things about the tail end baby boom, it’s hard to believe…

I think Robin Wright Penn is a fantastic actress.  Drugstore Cowboy and Forrest Gump come to mind…

But this one looks like it is going to be deep into the land of character study…(my favorite kind of film, btw)

Plus, that whole cast!  We have watched all these actors and actresses grow up onscreen — what mirrors of an entire generation they are.

“The past just keeps caving in, I can’t take it anymore…”

What a line that is.

This is going to be a really interesting film in terms of the tail end boom woman, and generation, I think.

Twenty five years of locked up stories under the placid serene exterior of so many…

And that cast!  All the greats!  Yay!

I was thinking based on the trailer that this is another part/aspect of the “Running With Scissors” tale?  The character of what appears to be Pippa’s mother on Valium or diet pills from the 60’s mirrors that same mother in the above film — the one Annette Bening played.  How many of our mothers were her, in some sense?

Here is a review from the Independent…

“…Her psychology is often penetrating, especially about the mother-daughter bond, “a deadly sweet and voracious passion”. The writing is rich in striking images. A glance is “like a magpie spotting a rhinestone”. The nests of brown-tail moths look like “cotton candy with worms in it”.

The conclusion is a pile-up of calamities, though not without the obligatory reconciliations and epiphanies. There’s even a promise of liberation for Pippa, who hitches a ride in Chris’s van and, like so many other characters in American fiction, heads west towards an empty horizon…”

More at this link:

The Private Lives Of Pippa Lee

“…Wright Penn literally embodies ‘the adaptable enigma’, Pippa, a beauty born into uncertainty from the start and, thereafter, trying desperately to find her own niche in the world, whilst giving the appearance of composure, peace and goodness in her later years. Wright Penn expertly blends Pippa’s past tragedy and loneliness of her current comfortable ‘retired’ life with some hilariously sardonic moments, as she slowly spirals into the waiting confusion and despair of her breakdown. Wright Penn puts so much into her character that we are left in no doubt as to exactly how she feels at any given moment, through her gestures, flippant comments and facial meltdowns. There is a very telling scene at the start when the Family Lee goes out to dinner and, unintentionally, ‘ignores her’. The brilliant Alan Arkin gives the usual faultless performance as ‘retired’, but still working hubby, Herb, who adores Pippa, but seems to be more comfortable and have more in common with others around him – even their two children, as they discuss their busy lives in ignorance at Pippa’s increasing isolation. But as the perfect hostess at any function, Pippa hides her true feelings, hopes and dreams, like other unappreciated, powerless, non-working members of society, trying to keep up appearances, but screaming for a way out…”

Can’t wait to see this one…