My February 2008 Viewings

Includes my personal ratings.
Recommended DVDs in bold.

Brooklyn Lobster 02/30/08 (C+)
Michael Clayton 02/28/08 (B)
Brooklyn Rules 02/26/08 ( C+)
Once Around 02/25/08 ( B-)
Amateurs 02/23/08 ( B)
She's So Lovely 02/20/08 ( B-)
No Reservations 02/18/08 (C+)
The January Man 02/17/08 ( B-)
Gone Baby Gone 02/16/08 (A)
Alpha Dog 02/15/08 (B)
Widows' Peak 02/14/08 (C+)
The Grass Harp 02/13/08 ( B+)
World Traveler 02/08/08 (C)
The Winter Guest 02/08/08 (B-)
The Feast of Love 02/08/08 (B+)
An Awfully Big Adventure 02/05/08 (B+)
All the Little Animals 02/04/08 (C)
Traveller 02/04/08 (B-)
Only You 02/01/08 (C+)

Feast of Love (2007)

.

"The end is always
right there in the beginning"
~Harry Stevenson

Love comes in curious ways -- and sometimes goes away so swiftly. Such is this story of people who, one way or another, connect through a Portland coffeehouse called Jitters.

Bradley Thomas (Greg Kinnear), the owner of Jitters, doesn't realize that his wife Kathryn (Selma Blair) is slipping away from him to Jenny (Kathryn Stana Katic), but Bradley's observant former professor, Harry Stevenson (Morgan Freeman), sees all -- and understands the reasons. And shares his observations with his wife Esther (Jane Alexander).

In total despair, Bradley falls into a rebound romance with Diana Watson (Radha Mitchell) who is still married but unhappy with David (Billy Burke) and together Bradley and Diana move into the "house with a sad history" next door to Professor Stevenson.

Meanwhile the young and beautiful Chloe (Alexa Davalos) comes looking for a job at Jitters. Bradley is hesitant but his barrista Oscar (Toby Hemingway) is smitten with Chloe and quickly persuades Bradley to hire her. Oscar has had a hard life having been abandoned by his mother to live with hs drunken and abusive father Bat (Fred Ward). When Oscar and Chloe move in together, Bat sets his eye on revenge against Chloe who he perceives as having stolen away Oscar.

As Diana realizes that she's only married Bradley to make David jealous, she leaves Bradley to return to David, leaving Bradley once again in despair. He's so saddened that he cuts himself to let the pain out and while being treated at the hospital, meets a nurse, Margit Vekashi (Erika Marozsán), and yet another romance begins.

Professor Stephenson continues to observe it all and the intertwining of these various relationships while he and his wife harbor their own secret sadness.

A favorite quote:

Harry Stevenson: There is a story about the Greek Gods; they were bored so they invented human beings, but they were still bored so they invented love, then they weren't bored any longer. So they decided to try love for themselves. And finally, they invented laughter, so they could stand it.

Directed by Robert Benton.

Rated R for strong sexual content, nudity and language.

My personal rating: B+