The Deep End of the Ocean Directed by Ulu Grosbard Starring Michelle Pfeiffer, Treat Williams, Jonathan Jackson, Whoopi Goldberg and Ryan Merriman   A L S O_.T O D A Y Blue Glow All "Behind the Music," all the time; "SNL" loves Raymond "Wing Commander" Reviewed by Andrew O'Hehir If you absolutely, positively can't wait for "Star Wars," this works as frivolous filler   ___________________ Read J acquelyn Mitchard's bestselling "The Deep End of the Ocean" at barnesandnoble.com ___________________     Y E S T E R D A Y Return to sender By Liza Bear Brazilian filmmaker Walter Salles talks about the inspiration behind "Central Station," his award-winning film about letters never sent (03/11/99)   R E C E N T_. M O V I E S Paths to glory By Michael Sragow From "Lolita" to "2001," Stanley Kubrick embodied the director as hero (03/09/99) "Analyze This" Reviewed by Stephanie Zacharek Robert De Niro gets the lion's share of laughs in Harold Ramis' mob comedy (03/05/99) "Cruel Intentions" Reviewed by Charles Taylor Retro morality makes for a pleasurably nasty update of "Les liaisons dangereuses" "Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels" Reviewed by Mary Elizabeth Williams A hit English crime caper arrives in America jetlagged (03/05/99) "8mm" Reviewed by Andrew O'Hehir Joel Schumacher's sadistic new movie is expertly crafted crap (02/26/99)   BROWSE THE MOVIE ARCHIVES COLUMNS FEATURES REVIEWS INTERVIEWS

Waiting to exhale A family drowning in grief resurfaces and doesn't know how to cope in the surprisingly moving "Deep End of the Ocean." BY ANDREW O'HEHIR If you suspect that "The Deep End of the Ocean" -- based on the Oprah-endorsed bestseller by Jacquelyn Mitchard -- is a heart-tugging, sentimental paean to the resilience of the American nuclear family, you're half right. Ultimately, this wrenching story of a child's kidnapping and its aftermath may sell itself short in its fervent quest for a comforting and comfortable ending, but it has none of the soaring string choruses, grotesque histrionics or girly-girl soft-rock Hallmark moments that make so many family movies unwatchable (see "The Other Sister," which wastes an appealing performance by Juliette Lewis, for a recent example). Despite its narrative limitations, "The Deep End of the Ocean" is so finely crafted, so alive with wonderful acting and an extraordinary commitment to realism that most audiences will be happy to surrender themselves to its improbable ride. Entrusting such a big-ticket project to the relatively obscure Ulu Grosbard, a 30-year veteran of stage and screen directing whose best-known film is probably the 1978 Dustin Hoffman crime drama "Straight Time," was undoubtedly viewed as a gamble. If so, it has paid off handsomely. Grosbard takes a story that could easily produce the rankest melodrama and instead delivers a subtle, studied portrait of a grieving family whose members aren't sure if they want to heal their wounds or destroy themselves. Every detail of the production, from Stephen Goldblatt's photography to Dan Davis' design to Elmer Bernstein's quietly unnerving score, is meticulously handled. "Deep End" is not a self-conscious or formally ambitious film, but it makes better use of the air, space and light that America offers in such abundance than most more artful movies do. Grosbard understands that his actors are good enough to hold the camera and that his most important task is to provide them with an uncluttered work area. For my money, neither Michelle Pfeiffer nor Treat Williams has ever been better. Watching them sitting in their kitchen eating cereal without looking at each other, we learn more about the Cappadora family than we could from 10 pages of expository dialogue. There's an unshowy elegance and ease to Grosbard's technique that is somewhat reminiscent of Hitchcock; Goldblatt's camera keeps us at a slight distance from the Cappadoras, sometimes quietly sidling up to them at odd angles as though we were the missing child who haunts their comfortable household. Grosbard and screenwriter Stephen Schiff, in fact, seem to have grasped that Mitchard's tear-jerker bears some structural similarities to a classic Hitchcockian thriller, in which ordinary people are thrust into a cruel and arbitrary nightmare that will change them in unpredictable ways. N E X T_P A G E _| Vanished without a trace