Watch Jack & Sarah For Free

The Worst Film Ever

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

The biggest problem with this movie is it’s a little better than you think it might be, which somehow makes it worse. As in, it takes itself a bit too seriously, which makes most of the movie feel kind of dull.

One of the strengths of this film is its subtlety. The first ten or fifteen minutes are a great example. Few words are needed yet volumes of emotion are communicated through those scenes. Another - later - example is where Jack and his father are in the park when it's snowing. The weather seems to exaggerate the raw, emotional pain Jack is going through but no words are needed because the viewer knows exactly what he is feeling.The scene where the grief hits Jack is very poignant - he has been almost in a trance until then, trying to carry on as normal and yet what finally gets him in touch with his grief for Sarah is the almost ordinary combination of her lipstick on the wine glass and her voice on the answerphone. He tried to be so prepared, so involved in his wife's pregnancy but never came close to being prepared for the real outcome.I hate to say it, but there are points during Jack's early mourning period where the character comes across as what I believe non-English people think of the stereotypical Englishman - blocking out any emotion. Perhaps this is a disadvantage of the story starting when it does - we don't get any idea of what he was like before his wife Sarah was pregnant. The baby next to the sleeping Jack is an interesting metaphor. At that point, both are helpless in their own way, both only in tune with their own feelings, but baby Sarah at least has the excuse of not knowing any better. Jack's selfishness is entirely self-induced.There are some interesting attempts to explode stereotypes, which I think should be applauded. The characterisation of Jack's boss Anna is interesting - the assumption that just because she is female, she will be more sympathetic would be natural but she comes across as so work-driven that she almost becomes heartless. I think Jack is a bit overwhelmed by Anna, perhaps too much so - there are moments when she is quite cutting and when Jack would be right to correct her. There is a curious comparison with Amy, who - although superficially like other females in that she cooes over Sarah - is sufficiently vague at first that she doesn't even notice which sex baby Sarah is. Jack also tackles another himself over the issue of whether he can use the nursing mothers' room to change Sarah's nappy.In keeping with the theme of stereotypes, it is interesting how the opinions of the other characters try to influence the main ones. Jack's mum thinks Anna is outwardly great for him when she is really a selfish character, while Amy - who is a far kinder person - is written off as a "dreadful American girl". The baby alarm worked rather well as a plot device - it's an overlooked but very useful piece of equipment. There are quite a lot of twists and turns in this plot - I think most are an intricate combination of clever writing and artful camera angles - but a lot of the plot development hinges on the budding relationship between Jack and Amy and when and how he treats her as a nanny or as a friend. It is obviously a grey area for them.On the surface, this film looks to be just your typical British romantic comedy but this one has some features that make it satisfyingly substantial. In terms of basic romantic plot it is broadly like Four Weddings and a Funeral, but unlike that film it is deeper and the characters are better written and investigated.

The casting being one of them. Richard E Grant, playing Jack is the first twist, a crazy workaholic type who likes to control everything and is completely narcissistic, witness him going through labour pains at the prenatal course.Jack is extremely unlikable, so much so that his pregnant wife, in an aside, whispers to her unborn baby that single parenthood might be ahead. Shift to the childbirth and the unfortunate death of the mother. Jack dissolves into morose alcoholism and narcissistic isolation.How Jack slowly evolves into something resembling a caring human being is the crux of the story. The supporting cast is amazing - Ian Maclellan, Judi Dench, Eileen Atkins - and they add points to a movie I would have rated below a 5 without them. Samantha Mathis tries but doesn't quite engage. We never know enough about her to care, apart from her infatuation with a guy who's bonking her best friend.I understand that Stephen Rea turned down the part of Jack and I would have preferred his tired jadedness in the role. Jack has a horror-movie type mania that jolts too much at times, I would seriously be reluctant to let him alone with a baby anything. Material has been done many times, but a nice twist at the end too. The main romance was so predictable, but so are they all in movies of this type. We go to them for no surprises, just the warm, slightly cloying fuzzies at the end. 6 out of 10.

that was one of the cutest movies I have seen in a while. The baby was just adorable. Eventough I was five when it first came out I saw it. I really didn't understand what it was about and why my mom was so sad. I just like the music. Now that it is ten years later. I can understand it this time and fully appreciate the trials and tribulations that Jack went through to ensure the survival of his daughter. There are some big name actors in the movie. Even though they probably weren't big at the time of the release a lot of things can change in ten years. I would recommend this movie to anyone who asks about a a movie with a baby and a it was a love story.

Life is not neat or logical. People can act irrationally or inconsistently and regret it later. Even when we try our best, with the best of intentions, things can go wrong. Events don't develop along straight lines. Beginnings and endings are often blurred and uncertain. Apparently random elements are always intruding. Does that mean a film that has those qualities is disorganized and frustrating or true to life? We've seen this story, or something like it, before: Man madly in love with wife loses her in childbirth, struggles to rebuild his life, encounters massive problems with care of the baby before finding Ms. Wrong Nanny who of course turns out to be Ms. Right Number Two. Why should anyone watch this one? MY reason for watching it is that I will watch anything with Samantha Mathis in it. Why should YOU watch it? Well, it's English, very much in the style of Richard Curtis's films such as Four Weddings And A Funeral, Notting Hill and Love Actually. It even has the same gimmick of an American woman in London (Amy, the Mathis character). But while this film has her plus a very strong British supporting cast, the disappointment is at the center: The Grant in this film, Richard E., is just no match for Curtis's Grant (Hugh); or maybe he was disastrously miscast. The Curtis films, while having as many pieces as Jack and Sarah, manage somehow to put them together better, and even when those films are just sort of noodling along, the hilarious one-liners are enough to keep the viewer going until something actually happens. Jack and Sarah's script is just not up to the caliber of the Curtis films. I would like to have learned more about how Amy (the Mathis character) wound up in London, or why she was working as a waitress. I would have liked to learn more about Jack's (Grant's) job as a solicitor: As with Ally McBeal, L.A. Law and The Practice, no actual work ever seems to transpire in the office. The most implausible element is the transformation of the character William (Ian McKellen): When we first see him, he is an alcoholic bum living on the street, and the next thing you know, he is living in Jack's house in the position of a very propah butler or butler equivalent. I suspect some intervening scenes didn't make the final cut.