Filmmaker Richard Linklater’s adaptation of Maria Semple’s 2012 bestseller doesn’t make a smooth transition to the screen. Semple’s anarchic, non-linear story revolves around an affluent and eccentric middle-aged woman who submerges her identity into her family, losing her sense of self. Her daughter’s inner thoughts propel the narrative, but on film this doesn’t work. The opening shot shows Bernadette Fox (Cate Blanchett) in a kayak, navigating through Antarctica’s ice floes—a setting to which the story will return. Meanwhile, Bernadette lives in a ramshackle old mansion in suburban Seattle with her workaholic husband (Billy Crudup), a Microsoft millionaire. The couple have a devoted 15-year-old daughter (Emma Nelson) and a dog named Ice Cream. Before marriage and motherhood, Bernadette was an innovative architect, recipient of a MacArthur Genius Grant. Now a stay-at-home-mom, Bernadette is a reclusive neurotic, acidly sparring with her uptight neighbor (Kristie Wiig), who hires a “blackberry abatement specialist” to probe the undergrowth between their homes and battles to maintain “global correctitude” at a posh private school. At lunch, a former colleague (Laurence Fishburne) perceives Bernadette’s dilemma, but after so many years how can she re-ignite her creative spark and retrieve her sense of self? The theatrical release was delayed numerous times and it’s not hard to see why, given the uneven, inconsistent tone and oversimplification of the complicated source material. Like its heroine, the film flounders. Optional. (S. Granger)
Where'd You Go, Bernadette?
Fox, 109 min., PG-13, DVD: $29.99, Blu-ray: $34.99, Nov. 26
Where'd You Go, Bernadette?
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