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'Winter Solstice': Emotionally detailed, achingly true

Many fine movies — "In the Bedroom," "Moonlight Mile," "The Son's Room" — deal with immediate grief.

The marvelous family drama "Winter Solstice" takes a longer view.

Paramount Classics 'Winter Solstice' B+ The verdict: One of those movies that feels just right. Director: Josh Sternfeld Starring: Anthony LaPaglia, Aaron Stanford, Mark Webber, Allison Janney, Ron Livingston Run time: 93 minutes Release date: March 30, 2005 Rating: R for language. See showtimes On the web Official movie site View the trailer    Trailers require Quicktime [an error occurred while processing this directive]

Jim Winters (Anthony LaPaglia) is a widower with two sons, 20ish Gabe (Aaron Stanford) and 15ish Pete (Mark Webber), who runs a landscape business in a suburban corner of New Jersey. From the very first scene, it's obvious something — rather, someone — is missing. Later, one of Jim's clients "casually" mentions this available woman his wife has been talking about.

But it's only about halfway into the film that we learn Jim has been a widower for five years.

The movie is a story of how stasis has turned this family stagnant and how change gradually creeps into these quietly desperate lives. How a kind of healing comes, without trumpets or fanfare, but not necessarily as a gentle balm either.

Gabe's decision to move to Florida to work on a buddy's boat becomes an explosive point of contention between father and son. Pete's penchant for troublemaking causes more friction, more fights.

But this is the wonderful thing about "Winter Solstice." In a lesser picture, Pete's rebellious behavior would be needlessly pumped up, Hollywood-style; he'd burn down a neighbor's house or his carelessness would send someone's 8-year-old to the hospital. Here, it's a matter of picking fights or engaging in pointless power plays with his summer school teacher over where he's going to sit in class.

Writer-director Josh Sternfeld makes his feature debut with "Winter Solstice," and he's a natural — weaving emotionally detailed, human-scaled vignettes into a compelling drama. His characters are funny or angry or stupid or thoughtless or kind in understandable, credible ways.

Just watch how Pete and a pal react when Molly (Allison Janney), a single woman in her late 30s who's just moved in down the street, asks a few questions about Jim. They're dismissive as only teenagers can be when it comes to the mere idea of older people wanting to have lives — maybe even sex lives. They're not mean or mocking, but you can see it in their eyes, in the way they stand, in their answers.

All Molly wants to do is invite the family to dinner. Neither Gabe nor Pete want to go. They figure theirs are courtesy invitations and besides, who wants to eat with their father and some woman hoping for ... well, something.

Jim won't have it. "We are going to have dinner with Molly Ripken at 7," he says stonily. "Live it and breathe it."

That's what Sternfeld's movie does so well. It lives and breathes. The pace can be slow, but that's sometimes the speed of life, too. This is minimalist filmmaking at its finest Ñ beautifully acted, dramatically fulfilling, often funny and achingly true.