Though this latest surefire sobfest from director Nick Cassavetes (John Q., The Notebook) basically amounts to watching a kid die from cancer for two hours, it somehow doesn’t feel quite as melodramatic as it could have been. That doesn’t make it a good film. It just makes it easier to tolerate.

It’s based on a book by Jodi Picoult and involves an 11-year-old girl (Abigail Breslin) who, having been conceived by her parents (Jason Patric and Cameron Diaz) primarily to provide spare parts for her leukemia-stricken sister (Sofia Vassilieva), files for medical emancipation. We hear voiceovers from a number of characters, including the lone son (Evan Ellingson).

To me, having to choose sides–determined Diaz or bright Breslin?–makes things more interesting. It’s obvious, though, that Cassavetes, who co-wrote the script, has already chosen, as Diaz is portrayed as something of a shrew for caring more about her dying daughter than her healthy one. We also get a twist late in the teary game meant to excuse Breslin for her seemingly selfish actions.

I imagine Diaz appeared in this thing either to increase her Oscar chances or earn some dramatic credibility. She acts mad, becomes a little crazy, cries, all that. But it’s all on the surface, and she doesn’t have the range to go deeper. Patric does a decent job as the patient firefighter dad, for sure, but I’ve always found him somewhat bland and he isn’t given much of a character to work with here.

Better is Alec Baldwin as the slightly slick but good-hearted lawyer who takes on Breslin’s case while hiding a condition of his own from her. Better still is Joan Cusack as the judge presiding over the case, a woman who recently lost her own daughter. The scene where she chats with Breslin in her chambers really resonates. As for Breslin, well, she’s not bad, either.

I don’t necessarily blame you if you cry at all this. Cancer is not a happy thing, and watching a kid vomit is not pleasant, nor is seeing her with a bald head and red-rimmed eyes and a bloody nose. But Cassavetes does include some smile-inducing elements, most notably Vassilieva having a romance with a fellow cancer patient (Thomas Dekker) that allows her to be happy and get dressed up.

Still, you will cry, especially when the family goes to the beach. As Breslin and Ellingson dash around, and Patric and Vassilieva and Diaz sit on a blanket, Vassilieva, wrapped in a blanket and with a handkerchief wrapped around her head, struggles up and walks toward the ocean as “Feels Like Home” swells on the soundtrack. Resistance is futile.

I have to give Cassavetes credit, though, for eschewing big speeches and death scenes, and for composing some truly nice shots. Like the scene when Diaz comforts her sick girl after delivering devastating news, or when Ellingson is on a rooftop, tearing up a picture he’s drawn and letting it blow away in the wind.

In the end, the film manipulates emotions a little too much, fails to fully flesh out its characters and features some really ridiculous courtroom stuff. It’s neither as entertaining as Terms of Endearment nor nearly as good as the wrenching Wit, which stars Emma Thompson. It does seem less syrupy than The Bucket List, but watching it is hardly something I’d include on such a list. – [DVD]

Drama

Rated PG-13

DVD Release Date: 11/17/09

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