DVD REVIEW: "Waitress"

"Waitress" is an enchanting fairy-tale of movie that comes equipped with a happy ending but is still draped in sadness.

The title character is Jenna (Keri Russell, who played Felicity in the television series of the same name) who escapes from the drudgery of her dead end job and a marriage to a man she despises by making actual and allegorical pies with mismatched ingredients and whimsical names. Her husband Earl (Jeremy Sisto) insists she turns over all the money she makes to him and, combining that with his own salary, keeps telling Jenna how he has provided with a fine home, the clothes she wears, everything she will ever want or need (as long as she doesn't want or need all that much) and therefore owes him her love and sex whenever and however he wants it. But Jenna has a plan of her own. She is not turning over all the money she makes. She is hiding a lot of it away so when she has enough, she can run away.

Then she learns she is pregnant.

Jenna doesn't think twice about having the baby, but she is not all that happy about it. In fact, when she makes her first visit to her obstetrician Dr. Pomatter (Nathan Fillion) she tells him right off to forget all the "congratulations on your pregnancy" patter, and just get with the program.

Watching "Waitress" is like watching Martin Scorsese's "Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore" if that movie had been sprinkled with fairy dust. It's arguably more like watching the television program "Alice" that sprung from Scorsese's film. Jenna even has her versions of Alice's Vera and Flo, although here they are named Becky (Cheryl Hines) and Dawn (Adrienne Shelly, and I'll have more to say about her later on). Neither Becky nor Dawn lead lives that would make their parents proud, but both agree that neither of them would trade places with Jenna. Then there's the epitome of small town southern man, Andy Griffith (pictured above with Ms. Russell), as Old Joe, the owner of the diner where Jenna, Becky and Dawn work, a man who strives to be as self-centered and demanding as Jack Nicholson's Melvin Udall in "As Good As It Gets," but is much softer in the middle.

The movie basically tells the story of Jenna's pregnancy, during which she has a bittersweet affair with Dr. Pomatter (although she refuses to call him anything else than "Dr. Pomatter," even in the throes of ecstasy). This interlude could have been handled very badly; you know the bit, the handsome doctor from the big city taking advantage of the sad country girl who thinks he will save her from her miserable life but, in reality, has no plans to leave his wife. But there is none of that. The movie deals with this honestly and the screenplay treats these people like adults and acknowledges their humanity. In fact, what all the characters say and do in this film comes from who they are, not what the script dictates.

Which brings me back to Adrienne Shelly who also wrote and directed "Waitress" in addition to taking the deliberately unglamorous role as the mousy Dawn. This is her third feature, but the first I've seen. Those first two films, I'll Take You There and Sudden Manhattan, did not receive much attention. "Waitress," on the other hand, was a major hit at the Sundance Film Festival.

Ms. Shelly never knew that, however. She was murdered a little more than a year ago in her Manhattan apartment, shortly after learning Sundance had accepted this film.

On the screen, "Waitress" has a gloriously happy, uplifting ending. But I couldn't escape the sadness that crept over me watching that ending, knowing that I would never see another movie like this one from such an obviously gifted writer-director-actor.

Grade: A-