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'Winter Passing': Nuanced, but not enough
by Hap Erstein

Thomas Wolfe was wrong. You can go home again, but you may not recognize anything about it when you get there. Struggling actress/bartender Reese Holden (Zooey Deschanel of Failure to Launch) is the daughter of two famous writers, two literary lions who live a reclusive life in Upper Michigan in Adam Rapp's Winter Passing. When she learns that her mother has committed suicide, Reese reluctantly travels home, motivated more by a lucrative offer for her parents' love letters that were willed to her than by any emotional connection to her father, Don (Ed Harris). Read the full review

TO SUM UP
A publisher offers $100,000 to struggling 20-something actress Reese Holden if she can obtain the love letters written by her legendary but reclusive father, Don. Suddenly motivated, Reese treks from New York City to Michigan, where she finds Don in flagrant disregard of his own health and living with two younger housemates: practical former grad student Shelly and would-be musician Corbit.

FILM FACTS ...

Yari Film Group

'Winter Passing'

Director: Adam Rapp
Starring: Zooey Deschanel, Ed Harris, Will Ferrell, Amelia Warner, Amy Madigan
Run time: 98 minutes
Release date: Feb. 17, 2006
Rating: R for language, sexual situations, brief comic violence and some drug use.

On the web
Official movie site
View the trailer
Trailers require Quicktime

READ THE REVIEW

The Palm Beach Post: B-
"Everyone is psychically wounded in this debut by writer-director Adam Rapp, who wears the film's literary tone too nakedly on his sleeve."