"Nobody brought a piece - it's not that kind of an evening."
This simple line, delivered more than ably by Harry Dean Stanton, now famous for playing the Godfather-like Roman Grant on HBO's superb drama "Big Love," represents "She's So Lovely" as much as any could in this relatively obscure 1997 film starring Sean Penn and his wife, Robin Wright Penn.
John Travolta, who was in the midst of his somewhat unexpected comeback following 1994's "Pulp Fiction," also stars and delivers one of his finest - yet least recognized - performances.
"She's So Lovely" was the last film written by Hollywood legend John Cassavetes before he passed away in 1989. His son, Nick Cassavetes directs, and his widow, Gena Rowlands, also has a small role.
History lessons aside, "She's So Lovely" is the story of Eddie (Penn) and Maureen (Wright Penn), the whacked-out love they share, and the crazy, sometimes incomprehensible, choices each of them are forced to make as they pursue the primal bond shared between them.
As the film begins, a pregnant Maureen sits in a dive motel waiting for Eddie, who has been missing for three days. Because she is an alcoholic, like her husband Eddie, Maureen eventually wanders out in search of booze and a good time. Long story short, Maureen runs into a neighbor, played by James Gandolfini (aka Tony Soprano), who gives her the liquor she craves, but he also attempts to rape her as well.
When Eddie finally returns home, he finds Maureen beaten up and goes berserk, accidentally shooting a paramedic who is treating his wife. This mistake, made in a semi-drunken rage, lands Eddie behind bars for 10 years.
The second half of the movie picks up around the time of Eddie's release from prison. When he goes looking for Maureen, he finds that she has divorced him and lives in the suburbs with her new husband Joey (Travolta), with whom she has two children. Joey and Maureen also have raised Jeanie, Eddie's child with his ex-wife.
As one can imagine, madness ensues, but it's not the kind that you might expect. What is mad is the choice Maureen makes at the end of the film, which leaves the audience feeling somewhat unsure of how to feel.
The movie is brilliantly acted by Penn, and his wife does her best to match his performance. As Joey, Travolta is brilliant as well. Even though Joey is kind a jerk, and probably not the best parent or spouse in the world, he is genuine and the audience has no choice but to feel for him at the film's shocking ending.
"She's So Lovely," which is available at most Blockbusters and online, is a great movie, and it's a shame that more people haven't seen it. The film reminds us, as well as any movie can, that behind the clean facades of landscaped subdivisions, people have pasts that always threaten to track them down.
What is fascinating about "She's So Lovely" is that we never know, at least until we have to face it, how exactly we'll react when our past does finally catch up with us.
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