Labor Day

A weekend in 1987. Adele, who is depressed, and her thirteen-year-old son Henry meet a wounded man in a supermarket and take him home. He is an escaped convict. Five days later all three are bound to each other. Jason Reitman adapted Joyce Maynard's 2009 novel and said he saw the movie in his head as soon as he read it, finding it different from everything else. It is a complete break from the sharpness of Juno and Young Adult; Reitman described the experience as making his first film all over again. Kate Winslet and Josh Brolin lead. Reitman said he could not imagine directing it without Winslet. The most talked-about scene is the peach pie, where the man teaches mother and son to work the dough together. Some critics found it earnest and others found it accidentally funny. On an 18 million dollar budget it grossed 20.2 million. Rotten Tomatoes sits at 34 percent, with praise for the leads and criticism for pallid melodrama and implausible plotting. CinemaScore audiences gave it a B minus. Who it is for: viewers who like slow, warm melodrama resting entirely on atmosphere. Who it is not for: anyone who will not believe the relationship between the fugitive and the mother. That is exactly where the film is weakest.