MOVIES: Then She Found Me (Helen Hunt, 2008)

Helen Hunt is star, producer, director, and co-writer of this movie, adapted from Elinor Lipman's novel.

Hunt plays April Epner, a woman in her late 30s who suddenly finds her life falling apart. She's been dumped by nebbishy husband Ben (Matthew Broderick); her beloved mother Trudy (Lynn Cohen) has just died; and local TV celebrity Bernice (Bette Midler) has just revealed that she is April's birth mother. As if that's not enough, her biological clock is kicking in big time -- she desperately wants a child -- which she fears will scare off Frank (Colin Firth), the father of one of her elementary school students, with whom she's entering into a new relationship.

It's soap opera and nothing but, but Lipman's novel has a breezy enough comic tone and narrative voice to lighten the weight of the story. Hunt's adaptation loses that lightness entirely, and sinks under its own drabness. Hunt plays April in one of those performances that we're supposed to think of as brave -- little or no makeup, no flashy hairdos or wardrobe -- but she only looks weary and haggard, as if director-Hunt has been putting actress-Hunt through too many long days on the set. The movie itself has the same drab look and feel, like a particularly low-budget Lifetime movie.

The only burst of energy the movie gets is from Midler, who gives a relatively subdued performance (by Bette Midler standards) and still has more zing and pop than anyone else in the cast; I love her explanation to April of her youthful inexperience: "He told me I had a perfect body, and I was too young and innocent to know that he was right." Broderick is even blander than usual; Firth's ultra-decent Good Guy routine is rapidly becoming a cliche that he desperately needs to escape.

Not recommended.