This film gave me exactly what I expected from its trailer. The good and the bad of it are all foreshadowed there.
The good side of this movie is that it's relatively WEIRD. The setup keeps the whole thing off-kilter, for a romance movie, which keeps some dramatic tension simmering. The movie is strange enough that you won't yawn while watching it; you'll probably appreciate that it's different from the hundreds of other romantic movies that you've seen or been exposed to. Also, it's a plus to have Josh Brolin in this role which he's perfect for. Kate Winslet I'm less convinced by. It seems to me that this story would work better with a plainer woman in her role; Kate's too good-looking to believe in her falling hard for some guy that she barely knows.
The bad side of the movie is the woman's choice to endanger her son, and the way she falls so hard for a guy she barely knows. I suppose that people do make those choices in life. But I think that such people's lives look different from the portrayal here. They look much more pedestrian and less grand. Any woman as vulnerable and careless as Winslet's character is here would quickly be a magnet for every moderately good-looking meth-head in her town. Some dude would have been sleeping on the couch long before Brolin strolls into this movie.
So, in the end, it's a movie and it manages to involve and to entertain, if not to enlighten or to represent. I give it a C.
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