A Major Disappointment

Great example of an old-fashioned, pure-at-heart escapist event movie that doesn't pretend to be anything that it's not and has boat loads of fun being its own ludicrous self.

The acting in this movie is really good.

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

Based on the bestselling novel of the same name, The Memory Keeper's Daughter is an emotional TV drama dealing with a family secret that eventually destroys a family. The film's cast includes Dermot Mulroney as David, Gretchen Mol as Norah, and Emily Watson as Caroline. The adolescent and adult Phoebe is played by Krystal Hope Nausbaum, an actress with Down syndrome.David and Norah are the perfect couple.He is a highly regarded physician and she is his beautiful, young, blond wife. Unable to get his wife to the hospital during a blizzard, David delivers their twins himself. A boy is born first but the baby girl is has Down Syndrome. There's a saying that some doctors suffer from a God complex, and it would seem that David is one of them.Instead of sharing the news with his wife after she wakes up, he makes the decision that he will tell her that only their son survived. He orders his nurse Caroline to take his daughter to an institution. There is a feeling of unrest and uncertainty as the characters sense that something isn't quite right. Norah, who never got to say goodbye to her baby, has never been able to get closure and is in a constant state of grieving. David lives with the guilt of what he has done, but doesn't really think he did anything wrong. Even their son feels that something is missing from his life. Caroline, who had always been a loner, winds up having the most complete life. Defying David's orders, she takes the little girl, Phoebe, and runs away with her to raise the girl as her own.Over the next 25 years, his disabled daughter grows into a beautiful adult while David watches the rest of his family fall apart, knowing he can never reveal his darkest secret. This TV movie offers some excellent acting by the leads. Watson in particular shows depth and compassion. To a certain extent, she is the moral compass of the film, but she also is its heart. The film is a far from being a great one but the message about acceptance of people with Down Syndrome - children and adults - is an important message to impart to viewers.

Dermot Mulroney and Emily Watson are appealing in this sad film.It deals with a spur of the moment decision that has a lasting impact on the lives of several people throughout a 22 year period.When his wife gives birth to twins, the boy is normal but the girl has Down's Syndrome. In a moment of misery, Mulroney tells his wife that the girl died in childbirth. He gives the baby to Nurse Watson with the instructions for her to bring the child to a home. When Watson sees the conditions in the home, she flees with the baby. Meeting a stranger in a snowstorm, she runs off to Pittsburgh with the baby and weds.The film shows that the "Down Child" had a perfectly normal life whereas the boy along with Mulroney and his unfaithful wife, encounter nothing but misery along the way.We should realize that it would take a death for everything to come out and this is exactly what occurs.Watson is just wonderful as the compassionate, understanding nurse who gave so much of herself to the child.This was a wonderful film and should not be missed.

a novel has a reading group study guide at the back. It's as if the author or publisher knows that the novel itself isn't strong enough to merit lively discussion without prompts or cues.That appendix of Kim Edwards's "The Memory Keeper's Daughter" provided a handy script for the Lifetime movie adaptation. But it makes a big gaffe, and it's a doozy: the title character and her brother are almost incidental!I read the book to the end mainly because I found Caroline Gill to be such a very strong, very compelling character. I never pictured Emily Watson in the role, although she is superb, given what she has to work with. But what is an actress of Watson's caliber doing in a middling TV movie anyway?Dermot Mulroney, as David Henry, is doomed from the start. In the book the reader doesn't so much feel what David is going through as he is told.The script doesn't bring the character any more to life, and Mulroney is not actor enough to fill in the blanks, nor to overcome the ghastly work by the makeup department in his final scenes.In the book and movie, David's wife Norah is used as a coat hanger over which to drape issues afflicting the disillusioned housewife: suspicion, booze, affairs, a time-killing job and self-absorption. In the thankless role, Gretchen Mol follows Spencer Tracy's advice; she hits her marks and doesn't bump into the furniture.Oh, well. There have been far worse books and far worse movies made from them. The novel "The Memory Keeper's Daughter" touches on so many issues that it explores only a few of them very thoroughly. The movie wisely cuts out many a subplot and yet it still feels long, sluggish and predictable. It's too bad that Lifetime Network, which has a huge following, doesn't spend a little more coin and effort making better movies from better stories.

I am always happy when books i read turn out to be made into movies. IT makes me feel special..because i know everything that is supposed to happen.I only learn about this movie last week Saturday when much to my surprise, a sideline ad said "The memory keeper's daughter Saturday @ 9". Of course i had to see it, and i waited and waited and finally i saw it tonight.I haven't read the book since the first time i did which was sometime in the ending of 2006 to the beginning of 2007. I may not be clear on the exact movements of the characters but i get the gist and to me, it was a good movie. Phoebe's character was well play, but it would have been nice to see someone else play the older phoebe. Paul's character at age 18, wasn't exactly the image i thought Paul would look like but he became cuter at 22.The book was good and this movie was equal to it, for me at least. I'm happy it came out, and honestly for a lifetime movie, i thought it was great. There was a few minor set backs, but it was a good movie!