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Well the only reason I bought this film was because Joanne Whalley was in it(and she didn't disappoint-she looks absolutely stunning and her performance shone!)Sadly the film itself ,for me, took too long to warm up, over an hour passed before I started to feel anything and that was when Mary (Joanne) revealed her tragedy, the scene was was very moving and strangely enough bits of comedy started to filter through as well after that .Up until then the three sisters Teresa(Julie Walters) & Catherine(Victoria Hamilton) and Mary seemed to be portrayed as petty and bland,the attempts at humour failed miserably and the reason for their reunion Mother's death turned out to be a grave affair -now there's humour for you!This is clearly a Girl's Film and not one that would appeal to many blokes in my opinion; the Screenplay by Shelagh Stephenson failed to inspire with most of the dialogue consisting of constant bickering between the three sisters and Julie Walters voice kept grating on me - the fact that the three sisters all had differing accents tormented me throughout the film and took away the credibility of the family bond and made it seem like three actors in a play instead of a poignant family drama.There was some male support from Mary's lover Mike(John Hannah) & Teresa's aging boyfriend Frank (Tom Wilkinson) but it seemed obvious that the script had been written from a female point of view with the way their two characters were portrayed and what made it worse was Hannah's wooden performance, Wilkinson was ok as a man beleageured without sleep for 36 hrs.The Direction was ok nothing exceptional and sadly for me there seemed to be excessive and inappropriate use of foul language as a substitute for humour -it wasn't funny and probably the reason why it was given a 15+ rating, which for a film this boring seems daft !Their dead mother (Patricia Hodge) appears frequently in flashbacks/memory but those scenes failed to evoke any feeling in me even though my own mother has passed away.The girls' father does not appear and is barely mentioned - to give you some idea of the imbalance/bias of the screenplay. If you want to spend 91mins of your life watching three sisters with uneventful lives bickering amongst each other then be my guest, if you are a fan of any of the three main women you may get some small reward from it but apart from the stunning Joanne Whalley this is a women's only film and I reckon you would need to sit down with four pints of lager to cope with the boredom.The DVD has numerous Newspaper Quotes saying how funny it is but frankly I get fed up of the media plugging British films that leave me ashamed to be British ! Sorry 2.5/5Read full review
This is a wonderfully heartwarming story of 3 sisters and the lives that they have led which culminates at the meeting up at on the death of their mother. This film will make you cry....both with laughter and sadness. There are some of the most hysterically funny scene that I have seen in a long while....especially the scene leading to the church for the funeral, probably not the funniest time under normal circumstances. Watch this wonderful film.
I am currently rehearsing as the eldest sister Teresa in The Memory of Water, from which the fil Before You Go is adapted. The film focusses, as does the play, on three sisters in te run up to their mother's funeral. The three women, all of very different characters and temperaments, look back at the memories of their childhood and their mother, arguing throughout about the discrepancies in these - where one sister remembers a certain set of details, the other two are certain to disagree with her, and each other. What is missing from the play is the setting - the play is set in winter, which gives an eerie, ghostly quality to the writing. The screenplay also dumbs down the original script, leaving some of the more moving moment and the poignant observations from the play lacking in depth and seeming false and trite. Julie Walters, reunites with her director from the wonderful Educating Rita, is excellent as always, but seems miscast in terms of her age - she seems more suited in this respect to playing the mother. Patricia Hodge lacks charm and elegance as Vi, the ghost of the mother, who appears to Mary, the middle sister. Mary is played with such deadpan impassivity by Joanne Whalley that she completely fails to connect and her character seems entirely unsympathetic and charmless. Victoria Hamilton, however, as youngest sister, wild child Catherine, is fun of contradictions, character and energy. She captures Catharine's self centered attitude without ever makin her entirely unsympathetic. Tom Wilkinson does a good job as Frank, though again seems entirely miscast in terms of age, while John Hannah's long-faced dour stylenis entirely suited to creating the role of self obsessed and self righteous doctor Mike. Lewis Gilbert directs with his usual passion for intimacy but the screenplay does him no favoured following the hatchet job made of the delicate and unusual original subject matter. The score is excellent - haunting and nostalgic. The flashbacks to the girls as children, playing in the beach, add to this. Overall, this film would have been 100% improved in every respect had the screenwriter had the humility to recognise that they would do better not to tamper with perfection. In trying to put a new stamp on this work, the original wit, humour, charm and intelligence has been lost, and we are left with only moderately amusing and often trite observations in the human condition.Read full review
Three sisters return to their family home after their mother passes away. In the days leading up to the funeral, the sisters struggle to come to terms with their conflicting childhood memories and the trials and disappointments of their adult lives.
I recently saw this done as a play on stage and thought it actually worked better as a stage play than a film. Some how the single location of the stage seemed enable the three sisters to portray more clearly the impact of their different relationships with their dead mother. However, the film is still worth seeing. I don't think the casting is perfect but it's a nice little story and, bearing in mind that it is based around a family bereavement, it actually has a strong feel good factor about it. Worth a viewing if you can buy it fairly cheaply.
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