355. Hope Springs (2012)

Starring: Meryl Streep, Tommy Lee Jones, Steve Carell

Director: David Frankel

Running Time: 100 mins

Hope Springs is an American film about a middle-aged couple who go on an intense marriage counselling course after one of them feels that their relationship is beginning to fall apart after 30 or so years of marriage.

This is one of those films that is, in truth, difficult to really dislike. Bringing both dramatic and some comedic aspects together, it was quite pleasant to watch, despite the fact that for the most part, it did create an atmosphere of incredibly depressing realism, which can be both commended, but also annoying to see, because it makes the film a little less entertaining.

Because of such realism in the film, the majority of the story was actually quite slow and dull, and I thought that that just made it somewhat less enjoyable to watch, because I began to lose concentration on the main emotional aspects of the film, taking away more of my understanding of the story.

On the positive side, the performances from Tommy Lee Jones and Meryl Streep respectively were both emotionally brilliant, as their portrayal of the problems experienced by the principal characters was so obvious to see, making the characters more interesting to focus on. (Steve Carell wasn’t that great, mainly because he had a very annoying character.)

Overall, I’ll give this a 6.2, because although it was a well-presented realistic and emotional story, it was rather inconsistent in keeping my attention due to its relatively dull atmosphere.