Reverential and offbeat, the road trip film Private lives of Pippa Lee takes emotional detours and is elevated by great performances, particularly that of Robin Wright-Penn.
Reverential and offbeat, the road trip film Private lives of Pippa Lee takes emotional detours and is elevated by great performances, particularly that of Robin Wright-Penn.
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Average Rating: 3.2/5
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Rebecca Miller (The Ballad of Jack & Rose) adapts her own novel with this comedy drama about a woman who begins a second life after her husband leaves her for a younger woman. Pippa Lee (Robin Wright) is the loving mother of two grown children, and the wife of successful publisher Herb (Alan Arkin). Despite the fact that she's 30 years Herb's junior, Pippa and her husband have never fallen short on things to talk about. She's always enjoyed the hustle and bustle of New York, but after Herb
suffers a serious heart attack, Pippa dutifully moves with him to a quaint suburban home in small-town Connecticut. And for a while, at least, she coasts -- enjoying frequent dinner parties with her new friends Sam (Mike Binder) and Sandra (Winona Ryder), and spending quiet nights caring for Herb, who has lately grown increasingly distant. That all starts to change when Chris (Keanu Reeves) comes back to town following a bitter divorce. Gradually, Pippa's suppressed resentments begin bubbling to the surface, highlighting the conflict between the free-spirited girl she used to be and the frustrated woman who has taken her place. Somewhere along the line, Pippa lost track of her own identity. But Pippa's remarkable journey of self-discovery is just beginning. Julianne Moore, Monica Bellucci, Maria Bello, and Blake Lively co-star in a Plan B Entertainment production. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi
As a woman under the influence of everyone but herself, Pippa often feels lost when she's on her own - a blank slate with no one holding a chalk - Robin Wright Penn allows us to get to know a character who still doesn't really know herself.
The movie has the busy-aimless feeling of a cocktail party rather than a rigorously constructed drama. Interesting people drift through, anecdotes are shared, attention shifts here and there, and abruptly it's time to go.
A superb performance by Robin Wright Penn illuminates Rebecca Miller's intelligent and revealing look at the inner wild child beneath a 50-ish Connecticut matron.
There's a deliberate quality to the storytelling that makes the movie drag in many scenes; and yet, numerous characters flit by that we don't have time to really meet.
Penn is such an intelligent performer that it's easy for us to believe everyone else in the film sees a different side -- a different life -- of the enigmatic Pippa Lee -- and that there are still many other sides to this fascinating character...
Robin Wright Penn gives an award-caliber performance in the title role of a woman trying to find her place in the scheme of things after moving with her older husband to a retirement village in suburban Connecticut.
All the midnight bulimic binges, suicide attempts, sleepwalking, marital chicanery, and little pills don't mean a thing compared to the thrill of being a middle-aged woman sneaking through the bedroom window like a teenager in heat.
Just as The Twilight Saga: New Moon taps into to the sexual yearnings and psychic disturbances of pubescent girls, so does The Private Lives of Pippa Lee for the perimenopausal crowd.
Very good movie which, I have to admit, I sat there bored through for the first 40 minutes. It was only when it got to the scene with the first wife that I started to understand the events that had shaped this dull-on-the- surface married woman. Blake Lively is excellent as the younger Pippa, as is Robin Wright as the
older one. I really wished I had paid more attention by the end, I think this one deserves a rewatch and is the kind of movie that will grow on you as you find yourself thinking of it the next day. Subtle, but beautifully done.
The Private Lives of Pippa Lee works as an involving high-end soap, the strong performances, writing and fractured chronology easing us past the more melodramatic twists. Robin Wright performs naturally and makes her character hold more depth and presence then was imaginable. And Blake Lively performs her part so
beautifully.Believe me about Winona Ryder's character does remind me and looked familiar to her 1999's Girl, Interrupted character role - so impressive!
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