| | | Includes Widescreen and Full Screen Versions.
Features: DVD, Widescreen, Aspect Ratio 1.85:1, Sensormatic, English, French, Spanish, Subtitled
Two-time Academy Award winner Sally Field delivers a "flawless performance" (TV Guide's Movie Guide) in this bittersweet dramatic comedy about one family's determination to stay together till the very end.Four grown siblings return home to their terminally ill mother's house for what they think are her final few days. When she hangs on, they find themselves stuck under the same roof for two difficult weeks. But as the children come to terms with their grief, they discover laughter in the midst of sorrow, love in the face of anger, and an opportunity to gain new perspectives on their own lives.
"...quite touching and stitched with black humor..." Box Office Magazine
"Very real, very moving and very funny." CBS Radio
"The movie's warm advocacy of hospice, with all the dignity such end-of-life care provides, does real, influential good." Lisa Schwarzbaum, Entertainment Weekly
"Ms. Field's tough, accurate performance is all the more compelling for its understatement." The New York Times
"It's fantastic. Sally Field is superb!" WNBC Reel Talk
Editor's Note
In STEEL MAGNOLIAS, which, like this film, stars Sally Field, one of the characters says, "Laughter through tears is my favorite emotion." Like that tearjerker, TWO WEEKS is a bittersweet film that manages to make the audience alternately laugh and cry. Field stars as Anita Bergman, a mother whose impending death from cancer draws her family together. Julianne Nicholson (FLANNEL PAJAMAS) plays her only daughter, Emily, who meets her oldest brother Keith (Ben Chaplin, THE TRUTH ABOUT CATS AND DOGS) at the airport with a self-help book in hand. The responsible brother, Barry (Tom Cavanagh, ED), and the baby of the family, Matt (Glenn Howerton, IT'S ALWAYS SUNNY IN PHILADELPHIA), soon arrive at their mother's bedside as well. With its wonderful cast, smart dialogue, and a genuine approach to grief, TWO WEEKS is a quiet film that deserves more attention than it's likely to get. It's a film that should be seen. It's a shame that Chaplin hasn't had a number of visible roles since THE TRUTH ABOUT CATS AND DOGS; here he holds his own with both Cavanagh and Oscar-winner Fields. After four seasons of ED and multiple guest appearances on SCRUBS, Cavanagh has proven his comedic mettle, and it's rarely been so clear as in this film. An hour and a half spent watching a woman die a painful death hardly seems like a fun time, but sympathetic characters and a large dose of humor make it more than bearable for the audience.
| Features | Learning To Live Through Dying Featurettes | | Two Weeks Group Discussion Guide | | Audio Commentary By Writer/Director Steve Stockman & Dr. Ira Byock | | Audio: English Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound | | Deleted Scenes | | Includes Both Widescreen & Full Screen Versions Of The Film! | | Interactive Menus | | Scene Selection | | Subtitles: English, French, Spanish |
| Technical Info
|
Release Information
| | Studio: TCFHE/MGM |
| Release Date: 2/17/2009 |
| Running Time: 99 minutes |
| Original Release Date: 2007 | | Catalog ID: 108570 | | UPC: 00027616085702 | | Number of Discs: 1 |
Audio & Video
| | Original Language: English | | Available Audio Tracks: English | | Available Subtitles: English, French, Spanish | | Video: Color |
Aspect Ratio | | Widescreen/Standard 1.85:1/1.33:1 [4:3] |
| Cast & Crew
|
| | Professional Reviews | New York Times
"Ms. Field's tough, accurate performance is all the more compelling for its understatement." 03/02/2007 p.E10Entertainment Weekly
"Sally Fields is formidable as the dying mother." -- Grade: B- 03/16/2007 p.49 Box Office
"[Q]uite touching and stitched with black humor..." 04/01/2007 p.130 Variety 6 of 10
A family's final days with their dying mother generates an indifferent emotional experience in "Two Weeks." With Sally Field as the cancer-ridden mom and the combined talents of Ben Chaplin, Julianne Nicholson and Tom Cavanagh surrounding her, pic veers unsteadily between melodrama and light comedy, with no confidence in either...Field's recent renewed visibility, stoked by her lead as matriarch on the TV series "Brothers and Sisters," should theoretically boost the film's profile after its Hamptons fest premiere in October. But any randomly selected minutes of that rather wan family drama are better than whole chunks of tyro writer-producer-director Steve Stockman's account of how siblings react to their mom's dying and to each other in "Two Weeks"...Nicholson, on a roll since her stunning work in "Flannel Pajamas," invests Emily with a lived-in quality that sets her apart from the rest of the cast, including Cavanagh in another variation on his usual deadpan manner...Vid-shot production, though pro in all departments, couldn't look plainer. MPAA's bizarre rating of R (for language and supposed sexual references) seems extremely harsh and unwarranted. - Robert Koehler
Reel.com 6 of 10
A heartfelt performance by Sally Field is the sole reason to see Two Weeks, an otherwise emotionally glib and schematically rendered tragicomic ensemble film, written and directed by first-timer Steve Stockman. As the dying matriarch of an embattled family, bidding farewell to her four adult children, the two-time Oscar winner invests her role with a poignancy that's missing from this broadly drawn and meandering film, which shifts tones clumsily and telegraphs almost every development through on-the-nose dialogue. Only a few moments in Two Weeks glimmer with true feeling, mostly thanks to Field, the standout in a cast that also includes Ben Chaplin, Tom Cavanaugh, and Julianne Nicholson...Reportedly autobiographical, Stockman's feature filmmaking debut is a sincere, if unsuccessful, attempt to blend mordant humor with domestic drama, but he simply doesn't have the cinematic assurance to achieve this delicate tonal balance, one that's eluded many, much more seasoned filmmakers...A crowd favorite at the 2006 Hamptons Film Festival, Two Weeks is ultimately more well-intentioned than well-executed. - Tim Knight
|
| |
|
|
|
