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Audience Rating: R (Restricted)
Binding: VHS Tape
EAN: 0696306009238
Format: Closed-captioned, Color, NTSC
Label: Polygram USA Video
Manufacturer: Polygram USA Video
Number Of Items: 1
Publisher: Polygram USA Video
Release Date: February 06, 2001
Running Time: 125 minutes
Studio: Polygram USA Video
Theatrical Release Date: January 21, 2000
Sales Rank: 22480
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Editorial Review:
Amazon.com essential video:
If you're among those who thinks that statuesque Sigourney Weaver is one of the best American actresses going, then A Map of the World is for you--it's a showcase for one terrific, Oscar-worthy performance. As Wisconsin farm wife and school nurse Alice Goodwin, Weaver projects an awkward, difficult woman--a quintessential outsider, too smart for comfort, at home in neither her own skin nor in life. In contrast to the Good Housekeeping perfection that flows from serene best friend Teresa (Julianne Moore), Alice's house is a mess, her kids hate her, and her ineffectual husband (David Strathairn) has never gotten used to the way she blurts out uncensored, often caustic truths.
In the time it takes for Alice--while baby-sitting--to find her bathing suit and glance at a map of an imaginary world she colored as a child, one of Teresa's daughters drowns. It's the first catastrophe of two--she's subsequently accused of child abuse--that mark the end of the Goodwins' world. Ostracized by her neighbors, jailed with "baby-killers," Alice slowly reconstitutes, drawing unexpected penance and community from her stripped-down environment. It's an utterly fascinating process, watching Weaver's character develop emotional focus and anchorage--as wife, mother, woman.
A Map of the World challenges us--refreshingly--with unpredictable narrative turns, from domestic drama to gritty slice of prison life to romantic interlude to courtroom climax and more. Along the way, this fine adaptation of Jane Hamilton's popular novel delivers insights into what it means to be fallibly human--as well as strong supporting performances by Strathairn and Moore especially, plus Arliss Howard and Chloë Sevigny. --Kathleen Murphy
Average Rating: 
Rating:  -
i had read the novel years ago but had never seen the film version, so when it was offered here, i ordered it with great expectations. maybe i forgot the story & overestimated it, but this is one of the Worst films made. Sigourney Weaver is Awful , a very stilted performance, awkward and spooky, slow, not moving, unsympathetic, not at all how i would have cast it. so i didn't watch it to the end. someone told me several yrs ago that it wasn't good but i wanted to see for myself.
sorry ... Read More
Rating:  -
We all know it but most of us labor to ignore it - disaster dogs our every step and falls from grace don't come with parachutes. Alice Goodwin, played brilliantly by Sigourney Weaver, lives on a farm with husband Howard, David Strathairn. She works as a school nurse and is raising two, often difficult, daughters almost single-handedly. When her friend Theresa, Julianne Moore, drops her two girls off for a play date, it's a mundane, domestic situation. Moments later one of Theresa's daughters drowns ... Read More
Rating:  -
I know this film is based on a popular novel but it almost felt like there was too much story here. Two families dealing with the tragic death of a daughter in the other's care (one movie). A woman unjustly thrown into jail with other "baby-killer" women (another movie). A courtroom drama of fighting sexual abuse charges (yet another movie).
A MAP OF THE WORLD nearly pulls off all of these storylines...except Sigourney Weaver's character keeps confounding us with distracting and even frustrating ... Read More
Rating:  -
This film was hugely overlooked and underappreciated. The performances are honest and very real. The story of a woman who, through a series of horrific incidents, misconceptions and misunderstandings, loses everything including herself. Sigourney Weaver portrays this broken down human being with humility and elegance. Weaver is all at once, strong, emotionally unavailable, depressed, sad, scarey, loving, supportive and charged. This is an Oscar performance if there ever was one. The style in which Weaver illuminates ... Read More
Rating: -
I have to agree with those who thought this movie was well done. I also have to side with those who found it frustrating and confusing at certain times. I can't blame this frustration and confusion on Sigourney Weaver though. I had to place it on the direction. There were times I felt as though the character was intentionally trying to punish herself. In the courtroom, the visitor's section of the jail. Maybe it's me, but I just didn't know at times which way the direction of the character was going.
The film ... Read More
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