An ungainly book adaptation, the kind whose awkward scene transitions and clunky story lines are in dire need of chapter headings. Flashes of the film suggest there’s a good story here, about the reconciliation of a New York City playwright (Sandra Bullock) and her boozing, Southern belle of a mother (Ellen Burstyn), but the filmmakers avoid the darker, more interesting passages of the two Rebecca Wells novels on which the movie’s based in favor of false uplift.
