Trailer Review: Mother and Child

Release Date: May 7, 2010

Website: Official Mother and Child site

Starring: Annette Bening, Naomi Watts, Kerry Washington, Samuel L. Jackson, Jimmy Smits

My Review: I know that parent-children relationships can be complicated, but this is crazy. There is so much going on in the trailer for Mother and Child, so you better be on your toes:

A surprisingly old-looking Annette Bening pines for the child that she gave up years ago and never had any contact with. But then she has a flirtation with Jimmy Smits, which is bound to cheer anyone up.

Naomi Watts is a woman who doesn’t like to stay in one place for too long, possibly because she quickly runs out of men to sleep with, as she beds both her married neighbor and Samuel L. Jackson (um, what?) in the course of the two-minute trailer. She then finds herself pregnant, but she’s not sure by whom. Jackson declares that if the baby is his, he wants her to commit to staying with him (again: um, what?).

Kerry Washington is desperate to have a child, but she and her husband are having problems conceiving. They decide to go the adoption route, which is problematic in its own way as the woman carrying the child she wants to adopt is very demanding. Then her husband starts to have second thoughts about raising a child that isn’t biologically his, and that’s never going to lead to good things.

Whether these three stories connect in any way or not is up for debate. At first I thought Watts was supposed to be the child Bening gave up, but after watching the trailer a second time, I’m not sure that’s the case. In truth, I’m just too distracted by the possibility of Naomi Watts and Samuel L. Jackson having a sexual relationship (um, what?) to really focus on anything else that’s going on.

Would I Pay For It?: No. I might rent it, or just wait until it shows up on Lifetime. Or just skip it altogether and watch some of the less melodramatic movies that all these actors have appeared in.