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Review by Susan Granger
3½ stars out of 4
Irresistible Renee Zellweger stars in this darkly comedic
romantic fable as Betty Sizemore, a soap-opera obsessed Kansas
housewife caught between fantasy and reality. She's a plucky,
small-town waitress whose philandering, abusive husband is brutally
scalped and shot in their dining-room by two professional hitmen when
a shady drug deal goes sour. Cowering in an adjoining den, she's
emotionally traumatized by witnessing the violence. Her reaction is to
enter a fugue state, defined by the American Psychiatric Assoc. as "a
combination of amnesia and physical fright," impelling the individual
to flee from customary surroundings, assuming a new identity. So, in
her delusion, she becomes Nurse Betty, a character on "A Reason to
Love," who adores Dr. David Ravell whom she jilted six years
ago. Determined to right this wrong, she takes off for Los Angeles,
not knowing that the hitmen's drugs are stashed in her Buick. Inspired
by "Being There," "Purple Rose of Cairo" and "Pulp Fiction," the
clever, twist-filled script by John C. Richards & James Flamberg
should cop an Oscar nomination, and Neil LaBute's farcical direction
contrasts with the bitter bleakness of "Your Friends & Neighbors" and
"In the Company of Men." Renee Zellweger exudes enough wacky,
guileless, sweet innocence to emerge as a beguiling Oscar contender,
yet it's Morgan Freeman who astonishes as the elder, courtly hitman
who does a dream dance sequence on the edge of the Grand Canyon at night.
Chris Rock is hilarious as his acerbic, hard-headed, excitable protege
with Greg Kinnear, Aaron Eckhart and Allison Janney delivering shimmering
supporting gems. On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, "Nurse Betty" is
a weird, deliriously funny 8, a crazed, playful, defiantly twisted collision
of alternate realities.
Copyright © 2000 Susan Granger
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out of 4
