Grace Is Gone

views updated

Grace Is Gone ★★★ 2007 (PG-13)

Stanley (Cusack) must tell his daughters—12-year-old Heidi (O'Keefe) and 8-year-old Dawn (Bednarczyk)—that their soldier mother Grace has been killed in Iraq, but he is too overcome with grief and his own insecurities. Instead, to buy himself time, he takes the girls on a road trip from Minnesota to Florida. Along the way, Stanley must confront his own demons as his daughters get more and more suspicious of that their impromptu vacation. Cusack (who also co-produced) goes against type, playing Stanley as an essential good but weak man. Movie avoids ideology to explore the powerful emotional effect of war on a family. Score was written by Clint Eastwood after he saw the movie at Sundance. 92m/C DVD . US John Cusack, Alessandro Nivola, Dana Gilhooley, Shelan O'Keefe, Grace Bednarczyk; D: James C. Strouse; W: James C. Strouse; C: Jean-Louis Bompoint; M: Clint Eastwood.