Running time: 118 minutes
Rating 4 out of 10
Danish director Susanne Bier received an Oscar nomination in the Best Foreign Language Film category for last year's After the Wedding and now makes her English language debut with Things We Lost in the Fire. It's a plodding, self-indulgent piece which seems to exist only to serve up two of Hollywood's leading actors with individual breakdown scenes, neither of which possess much in the way of conviction. Halle Berry stars as Audrey Burke, recently widowed after the death of her husband (played by David Duchovny and whose demise is seen in flashback). At his funeral there is an unexpected guest in the guise of Jerry (Benicio del Toro), the dead man's best friend and a former bright student turned drug addict.
Audrey tolerates Jerry's presence - just - but he is a hit with her kids and she slowly comes around to the idea that sheltering him in her home would be a good idea. But will Jerry stay of the smack and will his relationship with Audrey turn into something else?
The answers are slow in coming and when they do arrive they are not very believable. This is nothing more than a basic soap opera plot glossed up as wannabe high end drama. None of the characters motives are properly explained - least of all Audrey's decision to house Jerry in the first place. The second half of the picture gives both Berry and Del Toro their breakdown moments, and despite the undoubted conviction within them, it's impossible to feel in any way moved.
Bier has been making these internal personal crisis films in Denmark for some time and Hollywood now seems to have picked up on her in a big way, with remakes of two of her previous efforts - Open Hearts and Brothers - on the way. With a box office gross of under $3m in North America the public clearly voted to stay away, and on this occasion their instincts were right.
Paul Hurley
