To Gillian on Her 37th Birthday (1996)

Don't listen to the Hype. It's awful

One of the worst ways to make a cult movie is to set out to make a cult movie.

Excellent and certainly provocative... If nothing else, the film is a real conversation starter.

This movie tries so hard to be funny, yet it falls flat every time. Just another example of recycled ideas repackaged with women in an attempt to appeal to a certain audience.

This is actually a good case study for people to see everything that could be done wrong being done in one place :-) Not kidding at all. If you can realize how and why is this movie ridiculous and at least a few things that should have been changed pop up at you you'll learn something from Kelley's failure - and Brady's, since the play is not exactly stellar on it's own.Like the lack of a real antagonist (Esther could have been that but that requires some writing spine and ideas), the lack of a real dramatic reversal, watering down left and right (starting with long "karaoke" sequences), making all characters lukewarm and mediocre to the point that there are no clear leads, a "ghost" talking about her own non- reality akin to a spineless, self-doubting pseudo-intellectual and loosing even a trace of a mythical etc. etc.The audience for live theater plays may tolerate some of these things for all kinds of reasons and theatrical directors sometimes do have more spine and artistic bravery to tear a mediocre play apart and bring out some sharpened characters and stronger tension and emotion. In general, theatrical talking heads require some brave intervention in order not to be plain boring.So this is a rare confluence of a mediocre play, completely spineless adaptation and equally spineless direction. The sole mystery is whether Michelle Pfeiffer did this to make her husband happy of whether he was writing lukewarm to make her happy :-) One of them has to be the principal culprit.

Michael Brady wrote this play, and David Kelley wrote the script for the movie. The original poster of comments went on and on about David Kelley's "weak writing" but we must remember that it is a play, Broadway Play Publishers owns the rights. What is a wonderful play does not trancend to the screen with all the warm fuzziness the script calls for. While you are able to put in on Nantucket and you get the scene feel, it needs to be seen live. The casting is marvelous, and worth it to see Peter Gallagher play someone very lost, and the music could have been more haunting. All in all if you want to see it, do. It's a good story and an ok movie, but if a local theatre is doing Gillian, do go see it. It's better as a play.

David E. Kelley is a brilliant writer. The early episodes of Picket Fences & Chicago Hope, the later episodes of L.A. Law and just about every Practice & Ally McBeal ever made are examples of his great talent. The only problem he has is trying to convert that TV magic to the big screen. His movie scripts are enjoyable, but lack the energy and excitement of his great TV writing.To Gillian on Her 37th Birthday deals with a man (Peter Gallagher) who loved his wife so much, he just can't let her go. The wife's ghost seems to appear to him on the beach and he spends hours talking to her while neglecting their teenaged daughter (Claire Danes). The dead wife is Michelle Pfieffer, the best-looking ghost I've ever seen in a movie! The tension between father and daughter grows and the arrival of Gillian's sister (Kathy Baker from Picket Fences) and her husband makes things even more tense.This movie has a good cast who all give strong performances and there is a memorable scene with Claire Danes and Laurie Fortier in thong bikinis, but the movie is hurt by Kelley's weak script, which is not up to the level of quality we've come to expect from him.

OK, I know that this movie is based on a play, but still, does the main idea expressed by Peter Gallagher need to directly reflect a line said by John Cage on Ally McBeal 3 years later? Gallagher's character says that while he experiences this "fantasy", he is happy, happier than he is in the real world. John Cage tells Ally that you can't find happiness in the real world, and that is why she is only happy in her imaginary world. Hmmmmmmmm.... This seems a little redundant to me, but as long as we don't see the ghost of Happy Boyle on Ally McBeal, I can forgive DEK.As for the overall movie, I give this movie an 8 out of 10 stars.