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	Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood
	Callie Khouri Sandra Bullock, Ashley Judd, Ellen Burstyn, Maggie Smith, Fionnula Flanagan, Shirley Knight, James Garner, Angus Macfadyen 2002 Widescreen; closed caption; English, French audio tracks; French, Spanish, English subtitles; audio commentary by director/screenwriter Callie Khouri, star Ashley Judd, executive producer Lisa Stewart, producers Bonnie Bruckheimer and Hunt Lowry, editor Andrew Marcus and composer T Bone Burnett; eight additional scenes; HBO's "First Look" making-of featurette "Unlocking the Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood"; interactive "Ya-Ya Sisterhood" scrap book; music video "Sitting in the Window of My Room" by Alison Krauss; theatrical trailer.		Serious chick flick. Some shortchanged secondary characters hamper "Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood," but it's so unabashedly manipulative, it may reduce macho men to weeping. Director Callie Khouri's adaptation of two interrelated best-sellers by Rebecca Wells introduces successful playwright Sidda Lee Walker (Sandra Bullock), who has used her contentious relationship with her mother, Vivi, as the crux of a new play. Mama (Ellen Burstyn), a Southern hell's-belle, is infuriated; her lifelong friends (Maggie Smith, Fionnula Flanagan, Shirley Knight) intervene to repair the broken mother-daughter connection and mollify the Walkers' long-suffering men (James Garner, Angus Macfadyen). Which leads us to decades-spanning flashbacks about how vivacious young Vivi (Ashley Judd, in her best role since "Ruby in Paradise") got to be such a pill. The whole she-bang is dominated by top actresses going slightly overboard with the emotional weight and brittle humor of the colorful lives on display.


	Wednesday, December 18, 2024





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