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by Willie Waffle

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p.s.

Laura Linney is one of the most talented and beautiful actresses in Hollywood, but she deserves a movie much better than this.

Linney stars as Louise - a 39-year old university admissions director going through a midlife crisis. Her 10-year marriage to Peter (Gabriel Byrne) ended in divorce, but they are still friends. Her brother, Sammy (Paul Rudd), is a recovering drug addict, and her best friend, Missy (Marcia Gay Harden) lives far away with her husband and two children. Louise, with no love, feels alone and adrift in this world.

One day, she comes across the admissions form for F. Scott Feinstadt (Topher Grace). She is fascinated with this young man because he shares the same name as her old high school boyfriend, who died 20 years ago. Even more, F. Scott also is an artist like her Scott.

What will Louise do when it turns out F. Scott also looks like and acts like her old, deceased flame?

p.s. is caught between being a spooky mystery and a love story. Sadly, neither one of those stories is well developed. Written by novelist Helen Schulman and director Dylan Kidd, p.s. is grasping at emotional straws, trying to get us to care, but never laying out a compelling case to do so. While the scenario is interesting, it never fully pays off. Why does F. Scott remarkably resemble the old boyfriend? Why does he act like him? We never get a good answer to those questions, and they seem to be the big ones.

Instead, we are left to watch Louise go through emotional hell as she deals with old feelings she previously buried, horrible revelations by Peter and more. It's all for naught as the movie doesn't seem to have any direction or point to it. Maybe it's supposed to be about Louise's inability to accept change, but it fails to make that point. Kidd and Schulman aren't building up to anything.

Sadly, this leaves Linney and the cast in a lurch. They are all acting their butts off and trying to create emotion from nothing. Linney has created a wonderful, pained, troubled character, but it is not used for anything interesting. The same goes for Grace as he brings charm and mischievousness to F. Scott. However, this awkward love story falls flat because it isn't subject to the twists and turns the audience expects.

p.s. has some promise, but it doesn't deliver.

1 Waffles (Out Of 4)

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