Review: The Deep End of the Ocean
It is any mother's worst nightmare: to lose a child, not to death but to fate's cruel hand. In The Deep End of the Ocean, successful photographer Beth Cappadora (Michelle Pfeiffer) brings her two young sons Vincent and Ben, and her infant daughter, to her 15th high school reunion. She leaves the boys for a minute in a corner of the crowded hotel lobby. When she returns, only Vincent remains and Ben is nowhere to be found.
A frantic search, headed by Detective Candy Bliss (Whoopi Goldberg) begins. The casting of Goldberg is a bit of a misfire because her screen time is minimal and she seems more a distraction than an asset. It's also a bit of a shock how ordinary she is and how easily she fades into the background in this film. As days pass and Beth sinks deeper into her desperation, Bliss reminds her that she has other children to worry about. When Beth laughs at a joke Candy makes, she clamps her hand over her mouth in horror. Bliss assures her that to laugh is not to betray Ben; she'll survive. "I don't want to survive Ben," Beth says but returns home to Madison, Wisconsin to be with her other kids and her husband Pat (Treat Williams).
Adjusting to the absence of Ben isn't easy. She puts on a brave face for Vincent but the moment she steps into the house and spots Ben's stuffed animal, she's lost in her sadness. Vincent, showing off his basketball skills, realizes that she's looking at the animal and tries to distract her. Vincent, in many way, has had to be the parent. Though he is firstborn, Ben has always been the center of the family's attention while he has only been his brother's keeper. He tries to keep the family intact as Beth becomes enveloped in depression and ignores everything and Pat is helpless to do anything about it. It is Vincent who wakes up in the middle of the night to feed the wailing infant, it is Vincent who walks himself home and checks in on his baby sister when Beth forgets to pick him up yet again from school. When Beth and Pat argue, it is Vincent who goads his sister into crying so that his parents will stop. After the argument, Vincent joins his dad in the car and says that Beth just misses Ben.
Nine years later, they have all moved to Chicago where Pat has opened up a new restaurant and the family, especially Beth, appears to be well and good, as if nothing ever happened. But something has happened and, if the family has learned to get past it, they must learn to adjust once again for, on one fateful day, Beth opens the door and believes the child on the other side of it is her long lost son. There is no mystery here but there's plenty of irony to be found. The boy, who calls himself Sam, is indeed Ben and he has been living only two houses away from them all this time. And Vincent has seen him and never told his parents. What happens now when the child you thought was lost forever returns?
The Deep End of the Ocean doesn't completely satisfy -- there's a strange lightness to the film, quite curious considering that director Ulu Grosbard's films (True Confessions, Georgia) tend to be heavy with drama. Not that this adaptation of Jacquelyn Mitchard's bestselling novel isn't, but the drama feels built in and the whole unfolding and resolution is too neat. The jagged edges are supplied by the performances of Pfeiffer and Jonathan Jackson, who plays Vincent in the last half of the film. Vincent is truly the film's best character because he has the most ambiguity. There is no doubt that he loves his brother but how deliberate was Ben's losing? One has to think about that, especially after we learn that Vincent knew all along about the boy living two houses down who could be his brother. Why didn't he tell Beth? Did he want Ben to stay lost? Or did he simply want to protect the family from any more pain? Jackson, who has won numerous awards for his work as Lucky Spencer on TV's General Hospital, should become a big star after this. For those who have followed him on General Hospital, his immense talents have never been in question. Filmgoers will now discover what his daytime soap fans have known all along -- he's a major talent to behold.
It's deeply fortuitous that we have Jackson for Pfeiffer as the film could have benefited from a stronger leading man. Williams is merely adequate -- he knows how to get out of her way but Pfeiffer has always worked best with costars who flatter and provoke her feminine strength. Mel Gibson and Kurt Russell in Tequila Sunrise, Al Pacino in Scarface and Frankie and Johnny, John Malkovich in Dangerous Liaisons, Jeff Bridges in The Fabulous Baker Boys -- these men measured up. Williams doesn't really stand his ground -- when their characters clash, he's overpowered by her shattering ferocity. Nick Nolte, I think, could have made Pat's frustration more potent. Yet one can hardly blame Williams. Apart from the solo turn by Jackson, the film is Pfeiffer's aria.
The Deep End of the Ocean
Directed by: Ulu Grosbard
Written by: Stephen Schiff; based on the book by Jacquelyn Mitchard
Starring: Michelle Pfeiffer, Treat Williams, Whoopi Goldberg, Jonathan Jackson, Ryan Merriman, Alexa PenaVega, Tony Musante, Michael McGrady, Brenda Strong
