The Family Stone

After years of acting footloose and fancy free in the wildly popular TV series Sex and the City, Sarah Jessica Parker here takes on a rather more uptight role - albeit still in a comedy. She plays it admirably straight as outsider Meredith Morton, who's brought home for Christmas by boyfriend Everett Stone (Dermot Mulroney) where he's planning to propose. But his family (headed by a steely Diane Keaton) are thrown into upheaval, and the reception they give Meredith is as hard as their name suggests. The dearth of likeable characters make this an uneasy experience initially. Only the laid-back Luke Wilson is allowed to shine as the Stone sibling who succeeds in loosening Meredith's morals. That is until writer/director Thomas Bezucha begins to unmask the monsters to reveal a disarming humanity beneath. Except for a few maudlin missteps, the end result is a bold, warm yet sharply funny family portrait.