Then She Found Me

I love Helen Hunt.  I hate to limit myself to saying this or that is "my favorite", but she's at the top of my list.  I love her earnest way of looking into the face of who she's speaking to.  She's cute in a unique kind of way.  I watch "Twister" yearly.  She's great in it.  I love "As Good As It Gets".   If you haven't seen it, stop reading this and watch it now.  I was browsing through Netflix's instant view movies and when I saw she starred in and directed "Then She Found Me", I knew it was the one to watch.  I had never heard of it, but it also stars Bette Midler and Matthew Broderick.  How could I go wrong?

The movie made me laugh and cry and smile and cry a little more.  Helen plays April, a 39-year-old woman who has recently married her best friend (Broderick), who soon decides  that he doesn't want to be married to her anymore.  Her adoptive mother dies the next day.  April wants a child more than anything.  When she finds out a few months later that she is pregnant, she is resolved to see it through.  In the meantime, she has fallen in love with the father of one of her students (played by Colin Firth).  I won't spoil the rest of the happenings, but I loved the relationship between April and her new found love.  He is a little neurotic and holds a lot of anger against his ex-wife, but he sees April to the depth of her being. 

Midler plays April's kooky birth mother, whom she has never met before.  She is a tv personality and readily picks up on people's emotions.  She lies about various things and it is hard for April to trust her. 

I really identified with April's hunger for a child.  We have one.  He is lovely and keeps us busy, but.  for a few years, however, I have been hungering for another.  We discuss adoption from time to time, but never do anything about it.  What is holding us back?  Laziness?  Complacency?  Fear of the unknown?  Money?  The space in our two-bedroom-one-bath house?  Excuses, excuses.  I have written and erased this paragraph 3x already.  What emotions am I shying away from?  What truths?  Hmmmm.  Enough said for now.  Thanks for listening.