Synopsis:

After an accidental death of his brother, Conrad Jarrett (Timothy Hutton) attempted suicide.  Returning from the hospital, Conrad faces a family pretending that neither tragedy happened.  With a upper class businessman father (Donald Sutherland) who can't come to grips with the tragedy and a seemingly unloving mother (Mary Tyler Moore) who believes the wrong son died, his battle to regain normalcy in his life is an uphill climb.  

The Freak's Rating: C- : Ordinary People won the Academy Award in 1980 for Best Picture, beating Raging Bull and Coal Miner's Daughter.  Both of the latter are better movies, though Ordinary People does have some meat in its story.  No doubt inspiring tons of clones in its day, Ordinary People does a decent job of capturing American tendency to strive for familial normalcy, at least in the public eye.  If you want to see the film that does this perfectly, rent American Beauty.

Ordinary People climbs to the top of my queue because it is deemed as one of the better movies in the last century, winning multiple awards.  Many other films get on my list for the same reasoning.  Problems I encounter while reviewing these films are that they don't stand the test of time very well.  A great movie should do that.  Some classics I have reviewed that do so are My Fair Lady, Dog Day Afternoon and Serpico.  These movies are solid, not just for the time they were released, but for eternity.  That said, Ordinary People isn't a bad film, just one that needs more direction.  Robert Redford had his directorial debut with this one and it is blatant.  Pacing is quite poor, the musical score is uncomfortably silent and camera angles straight out of film school.  The acting in this picture is superb though, with Moore giving an incredible 180 performance from the sweet comical girl on television to the dramatic socially conscious housewife.  Judd Hirsch, Timothy Hutton and Donald Sutherland are also spectacular in their roles.  Storyline and acting are solid, but this needed more effort in production.  Go rent Raging Bull or Coal Miner's Daughter, both better movies for the year.

Jen's Rating: C- : Ordinary, that's what this movie was!  It was just so slow I kept wanting it to go somewhere.  Acting was decent and I understand what they were going for but there was no substance to this movie.  I actually fell asleep during it and that does not happen often for me.

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