billy crudup and joaquin phoenix as brothers? ok, i’ll buy it… for the sake of the movie experience. the two acted their hearts out in this film. jennifer connelly looked hella different in the nineties, perhaps even — dare i say it? — fugly. liv tyler, conversely, looked like the natural beauty she always is. i’m glad to say her acting abilities have sharpened over the years, as inventing the abbotts is not the best display of her skills.

a lot of people have bad-mouthed this film, maybe because there are a lot of well known actors in it who don’t really get a chance to shine, save for joaquin phoenix. i had never even heard of this movie before i borrowed it from my uncle a couple of years ago; after i watched it, i really liked it, but not enough ot purchase it for myself. i eventually found it on sale for $7 and thought, “screw it. joaquin and billy look good in it.”

it wasn’t a spectacular film. it was slow-paced and a little puzzling with the time frames, but it’s the characters that really move the plot along. it’s sort of a typical romeo-and-juliet story between pam abbott and doug holt, but played out quite interestingly in a fifties setting.