Buoyant ‘Hope’

“Hope Floats” has a terrific opening. Tempted by the offer of a free make-over, a Chicago housewife and mother (Sandra Bullock) goes on a Jerry Springer-type TV show (hosted by a deliciously unctuous Kathy Najimy) only to be confronted unexpectedly by her best friend (an unbilled Rosanna Arquette), who promptly announces that she’s having an affair with Bullock’s husband.

Completing the horrendously public devastation is the appearance of the unfaithful husband (Michael Pare) who has no idea he’s going to be confronted with his wife and lover.

Totally devastated, Bullock’s Birdee Pruitt does what many women with few options would do under the circumstances: run home to mother. In this instance mother happens to be Ramona Calvert (Gena Rowlands), a free spirit living in a fine old house in a beautiful small town in West Texas.

Yet as inviting as this Norman Rockwell community looks to be, it is not an unalloyed safe haven. Ramona is a beautiful woman with a dynamic personality and a lot of wit, much wisdom and self-knowledge but she does not realize she has failed to express the love she genuinely has for her daughter. It’s always been her father (James N. Harrell) who gave Birdee the warm embraces and made clear his affection, but now he is in a rest home suffering from Alzheimer’s; his ability to comprehend life is wavering at best.

“Hope Floats” itself wavers. At its core is a strong drama about the need for the mothers and daughters to communicate their love for each other and about how a woman with few resources copes with having to rebuild her life from scratch.

In his second feature (following “Waiting to Exhale”) the formidable actor Forest Whitaker sensitively directs a sterling cast in Steven Rogers’ in many ways admirable script. But “Hope Floats” is undercut by that soft, sentimental Hollywood glow, a lot of artificial cutesy-poo comic touches around the edges--does Ramona really have to have a thing for stuffed animals?--and too many golden oldies on its soundtrack edging out Dave Grusin’s apt score.

The filmmakers might have benefited from a screening of the timeless “Picnic” as an example of how to portray small-town American life free of quaintness and caricature but not of humor. A sharper edge could have taken a pretty good, if uneven, picture to greater heights, considering its potent ingredients and actors.

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Even so, “Hope Floats” gives good value, starting with Bullock’s and Rowlands’ knockout performances. Pare is likewise impressive as a man whose good looks have belied an essential weakness of character, and so is Cameron Finley as Birdee’s imaginative, sweet-natured little nephew, left to Ramona by her sister who’s gone off to pursue a career in Hollywood.

At its best “Hope Floats” delineates insightfully not only Birdee and Ramona’s relationship and that of Birdee with her little daughter Bernice (Mae Whitman, easily as effective as Bullock and Rowlands) but also of Birdee and Bernice to adjusting to small-town life. Birdee left home as the gorgeous prom queen who married the handsome high school star quarterback and has now returned, humiliated on national TV, with no job skills, too many bad hair days and too many contemporaries with long-held jealousies unable--or unwilling--to hide their gloating at her return in defeat.

If Birdee is going to have any kind of life she’s really going to have to dig in. Similarly, Bernice has to go through the familiar ordeal of being the new kid in school, adjusting to a radically different environment, and therefore longing only for her beloved father--she too is a father’s girl--to come rescue her.

Not all is grim for Birdee, because who should be Ramona’s handyman but Justin Matisse (Harry Connick Jr.), ruggedly handsome in tight jeans, who adored Birdee in high school but was too shy to say so. It seems Justin, an artisan-level carpenter, is back from California, where his painstaking qualities made him “too slow” on the job and is now building his own Neo-Craftsman cottage in a forest, happy to be back where he can be “doing things the right way.”

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There’s no doubting Connick’s impact as Justin, but speaking of “Picnic,” this man could use at least a measure of character development afforded William Holden’s unforgettable Hal, the archetypal sexy guy in a small town.

The patient Justin is your basic Sensitive Hunk, but Connick and the story warrant more than this. We know nothing of Justin’s personal life. Is he divorced? Has he been seeing anyone else when Birdee returns? We need to know more about the man to make him seem more than a plot contrivance. (Justin’s improbable surname does elicit a genuine laugh when Birdee’s daughter says she never wants to be known as “Bernice Matisse.”)

“Hope Floats,” which fortunately does pull together for a strong finish, is nevertheless a real plus for Bullock, who served as the film’s co-executive producer. She’s had difficulty capitalizing on her career-making appearance four years ago in “Speed” after some dismal choices (“Speed 2” among others) and this is a step in the right direction.

Birdee requires Bullock to dig deep to portray a woman who above all else has to define for herself whatever responsibility she had for the failure of her marriage. To her credit Bullock gave herself the challenge of acting opposite the eternally radiant Rowlands, one of the movies’ enduring vital presences--and, under Whitaker’s caring direction, more than holds her own.

* MPAA rating: PG-13, for thematic elements. Times guidelines: The impact of a death scene and of parents bitterly separating depicted in the film may be too intense for some children, especially the very young.

‘Hope Floats’

Sandra Bullock: Birdee Pruitt

Harry Connick Jr.: Justin Matisse

Gena Rowlands: Ramona Calvert

Mae Whitman: Bernice Pruitt

A 20th Century Fox presentation of a Lynda Obst production in association with Fortis Films. Director Forest Whitaker. Producer Obst. Executive producers Mary McLaglen, Sandra Bullock. Screenplay by Steven Rogers. Cinematographer Caleb Deschanel. Editor Richard Chew. Costumes Susie DeSanto. Music Dave Grusin. Production designer Larry Fulton. Art director Christa Munro. Set decorator Douglas A. Mowat. Running time: 1 hour, 50 minutes.

* In general release throughout Southern California.