I know I’m supposed to look at every film on its own merits. I had too many questions though about this movie, and looking up the British mini-series that this was based on and the pre-production for this explained a lot of my concerns. First of all, this movie feels like a mini-series. There are a lot of moving parts in it with Sandra Bullock’s Ruth trying to rebuild her like, possibly starting a relationship with Jon Bernthal’s Blake, getting a lawyer to help her track down her sister (Aisling Franciosi), the dynamics of the sister’s adopted family, and the sons of the dead cop deciding to get revenge of Ruth. Oh, and the sons’ family drama, and the sister working through unformed memories of Ruth, and the big reveal. This would make way more sense with 6-10 episodes of breathing room (or at least three like the original mini-series), like a Sharp Objects or even looser-formed like a Rectify. We are way past the point where a 1h52m movie should be struggling to give Viola Davis something to do. No, if you have Viola Davis, she gets more to do. The beats of the story don’t really fit a film structure.
Looking at the plot of the British mini-series makes more sense too. The Ruth character is 17 when she goes to jail and serves for 15 years. It’s not so weird that she would have a young sister who she is surrogate mother too. The Unforgivable film really struggles to make the ages work. Bullock is 57. They up her prison sentence to 20 years. Even if we knock off 10 years for good genes, that puts Bullock into her mid-20s at the time of the inciting event. With a 17-year-old, I understand the situation snowballing so poorly. A teenager can’t adopt her 5-year-old sister. There’s no way she’d be able to secure a job to figure out a living situation. And she’d be much more likely to escalate the situation simply due to not having enough life experience. Move the Ruth character to her mid-20s and it all makes less sense. She’d probably have a job and be in a much more stable situation. It’s hard for me to look at Bullock in the flashbacks and see an overwhelmed young woman. This also messes with the sister’s situation too. The math means that Aisling Franciosi is supposed to be 25 in the film. Even factoring in the car accident, everything about her situation from the recital to the sister makes Franciosi feel like a young college student, not a grad student or later. A 15-year sentence like the series puts the sister at 20-years-old, which is how she’s written here. Apparently, Angelina Jolie was originally set to play Ruth. At 46, she makes a bit more sense, but not really.
This movie was doomed by bad adaptation decisions and incorrect casting. All the actors are fine in it. Bullock gives a good performance. Bernthal is quite charming. Davis is good in her few scenes. There isn’t a real weak performance except perhaps the cop’s sons. They are all just trying to make something work that can’t, given the pieces.
Verdict: Strongly Don’t Recommend
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