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Nine Lives Our rating: Your rating: 1 2 3 4 Your Comments: see all MPAA rating: R (for language, brief sexual content, and some disturbing images) Genre: Drama Theater release: August 10, 2009 by Magnolia Pictures Directed by: Rodrigo Garcia Runtime: 1 hour 55 minutes Cast: Kathy Baker (Camille), Amy Brenneman (Lorna), Elpidia Carrillo (Sandra), Glenn Close (Maggie), Stephen Dillane (Martin), Dakota Fanning (Maria), William Fichtner (Andrew), Lisa Gay Hamilton (Holly), Holly Hunter (Sonia), Jason Isaacs (Damian), Joe Mantegna (Richard), Ian McShane (Larry), Aidan Quinn (Henry), Miguel Sandoval (Ron/Male Guard), Amanda Seyfried (Samantha), Sissy Spacek (Ruth), Robin Wright Penn (Diana) Related: Talk About It/Family Corner

There are twenty names on the poster for Nine Lives, and they represent a remarkably strong ensemble of talented actors. Director/writer Rodrigo Garcia (Ten Tiny Love Stories, Things You Can Tell by Looking at Her) seems to have no trouble attracting gifted people to his projects, and his new film captures such uniformly moving and believable performances, it's easy to see why.

Nine Lives is really a series of nine short films featuring nine female characters. Each vignette consists of a 10-14 minute emotionally charged slice of the character's life, shot elegantly and inventively in a single continuous take. Reportedly filmed in just 18 days (2 days per story), the approach is exhilarating rather than gimmicky, and the actors seem to relish the challenge, giving full-blooded, convincing performances that seldom ring a false note.

The film opens with Elpidia Carrillo as an inmate in a women's prison

The movie opens in the claustrophobic corridor of a women's prison, and we are introduced to an inmate named Sandra. Played with sullen intensity by Elpidia Carillo (also in Garcia's Things You Can Tell by Looking at Her), Sandra works feverishly to earn the privileges "good behavior" can buy her, only to erupt in rage when her monthly visit with her young daughter is sabotaged by a malfunctioning prison phone. In the 12-14 minutes Garcia spends on Sandra, we are given a nuanced and powerful study of conflicting emotions—regret, defiance, grim determination, longing, and despair.

The stories that follow move from Sandra's literal prison to a variety of emotional ones. Robin Wright Penn (White Oleander, Message in a Bottle) gives arguably the film's finest performance as Diana, a married woman pregnant with her first child who becomes completely disoriented when she runs into her old flame Damian (Jason Isaacs) in a grocery store. The confusion of tension and attraction between Diana and Damian is palpable and unexpectedly moving.

Next we meet Holly, an emotionally distraught young woman played by Lisa Gay Hamilton (TV's The Practice). Holly returns to her childhood home and waits, troubled and manic, to confront her stepfather over serious traumas inflicted in the past. For my taste, there are a few over-the-top moments in this episode, but it could be argued that Holly is dealing with an over-the-top situation that makes her unraveling believable and even appropriate.

Holly Hunter and Stephen Dillane as a couple with some issues

The fourth vignette features Sonia (the always affecting Holly Hunter) and her boyfriend Martin (Stephen Dillane). The camera follows the couple on a visit to see their friends' posh new apartment, winding down long hallways and into the elevator, where we suffer through Sonia's claustrophobia with her. In Sonia's story, the tension is less overtly dramatic than in some of the other scenes, but the emotional impact is no less shattering when Martin vindictively reveals a wounding secret to the couple's friends.

Nine Lives' next chapter stars Amanda Seyfried (Mean Girls) as Samantha, a teenager torn between two needy and politely estranged parents. Samantha's wheelchair-bound father, Larry (Ian McShane), and emotionally-drained mother, Ruth (Sissy Spacek), assure her they'll be fine if she leaves home for college, and yet they can't seem to give her the space she needs to travel from the kitchen to the privacy of her bedroom.

The film's sixth story revolves around Lorna (Amy Brenneman), who attends the funeral of her ex-husband Andrew's second wife and discovers that many of the mourners blame her for the suicidal death. Andrew's inappropriate but urgent sexual advances further complicate the situation.

Ruth (Sissy Spacek) and her gregarious suitor Henry (Aidan Quinn)

In his seventh vignette, Garcia circles back to Ruth (Spacek) and lets us see more deeply into her conflicted life. While daughter Samantha and crippled-husband Larry are presumably at home, Ruth is entering into a hotel room and potential adultery with a gregarious suitor named Henry (Aidan Quinn).

Ten minutes later we meet Camille (Kathy Baker), a cancer patient who rants generally at the world and specifically at her husband Richard (Joe Mantegna) as medical staff prepare her for a mastectomy. Camille's terror and rage have her jumping out of her skin, but as tranquilizers take their effect her face softens and we catch a glimpse of the woman she is in health. In one of Nine Lives' most tender moments, we also see Richard's love and aching concern for his wife.

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