WAITRESS

Director: Adrienne Shelly (low budget indy films, starred in some Hal Hartley movies)
Starring: Keri Russell, Jeremy Sisto, Nathan Fillion

It's impossible to talk about Waitress without mentioning the sad fate of director Shelly. It's also impossible to watch this cute film, which is simultaneously sad, funny, and optimistic, without feeling a little dread at the real-life events surrounding it. Shelly has been a marginal player for years in the film industry, her previous high-point probably being her starring roles in the early (good) Hal Hartley movies The Unbelievable Truth and Trust. Waitress would have been a new high point in her career I think. Unfortunately, Ms Shelly was randomly murdered one day while working. It seems that she started an argument with an illegal teenage immigrant about construction noise in a neighboring apartment. So he killed her.

So, watching this bittersweet film becomes even more bitter. Luckily, the film is good enough to make you forget the sad truth while you're watching it.

Waitress is the story of a young woman (Russell) with a talent for making pies, a job in a pie diner, a pretty face, and very dim prospects for a happy future. She's married to the most loutish of louts (Sisto), a terrible man who's own low self-esteem is almost pitiful to behold. He's so extremely controlling that it's perhaps difficult to believe he could actually exist in today's modern America. Luckily this story exists as a fairy tale rather than as any kind of realistic portrait, so disbelief isn't too hard to suspend. She has two friends, other waitresses at the diner, both cute, perky, and quirky themselves. She also manages to struggle through her situation with an upbeat attitude despite her fatalistic belief that her future is for certain. She has no money (and what little she does have is taken by her husband), and she has a baby she doesn't want on the way. She's stuck in a horrible marriage. She's just stuck.

Right about now is where she meets a handsome, nerdy Ob-Gyn (Fillion), and if ever an affair was in order, it was in order for her. So she cheats, and you can't really fault her for it one bit. A wise old regular at the diner (played wonderfully by Andy Griffith) tells her that no matter how right it might seem, it's always better to just not cheat, but what are you going to do.

For the rest of her pregnancy high jinx ensue, as she struggles through her affair, and her friends start their own silly relationships. Through it all, however, there are always moments of terrible reality that occasionally bring us back to earth. The husband finds money that she's stashed away in the house, or sees her with a suitcase at a bus stop and frighteningly accosts her. He's a scary guy because he's a child. He's so terrified himself that he could lash out at any time. He's a very good character creation.

Finally, in the most wrapped up and neat of endings, it all works out for our little waitress. I won't spoil it, except to say it's a tad obvious, and not particularly effective climax. But ending aside, the film as a whole works well. It's a cute, bittersweet, funny little film. Equal parts romantic comedy and black comedy. I liked it a lot.

Of course the saddest thing is that Ms. Shelly won't experience the rest of her life at all, but it seems just a tad more terrible that she didn't even get to experience some of the accolades that she deserves for this fine little film. What a downer.

Standouts: Good script, good direction. A cute little film.
Blowouts: The ending was completely mundane.

Grade: B+