The Face of Love

What would you do if you came across someone who looked exactly like your dead spouse? In The Face of Love, this dilemma presents itself to Nikki (Annette Bening), a middle-aged widow who is taken aback when she sees an exact double of her late husband, Garrett (Ed Harris). Feeling alive for the first time in years, she tracks down the doppelganger - a divorced art teacher named Tom (also Harris) - and approaches him. Before long, they have entered into an intoxicating yet twisted relationship, with Nikki neglecting to tell Tom about his striking similarities to Garrett. From here, the story's plausibility becomes stretched in places, while Robin Williams is wasted in an underwritten role as Nikki's neighbour. But the film is held together by fine performances from Bening and Harris, both of whom are utterly convincing, even when the film around them isn't.