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	Little Children
	Todd Field Kate Winslet, Patrick Wilson, Jennifer Connelly, Jackie Earle Haley, Gregg Edelman, Noah Emmerich, Phyllis Somerville, Raymond J. Barry, Sadie Goldstein, Ty Simpkins 2006		Avoiding the smack of highbrow soap opera or lowbrow "Desperate Housewives"-style ribaldry, "Little Children" is the incisive, troubling, expertly-acted screen adaptation of Tom Perrotta's novel about marital infidelity, paranoia and aberrant behavior in a well-manicured Massachusetts suburb. Attractive, discontented young mother Sarah (Kate Winslet) spends the afternoon with her daughter at the local playground, where they encounter handsome, restless stay-at-home dad Brad (Patrick Wilson) and his son. After pulling a harmless prank on a coterie of gossiping playground moms, Brad and Sarah are drawn together and become increasingly estranged from their respective spouses (Jennifer Connelly, Gregg Edelman). Meanwhile, the community is rent asunder by the return of a convicted sex offender (Jackie Earle Haley) who moves back into his mother's house and becomes the target of an obsessive, disgraced cop (Noah Emmerich). The bemused tone of an unseen narrator provides a dryly humorous counterpoint to the proceedings. Director Todd Field, whose previous feature was the celebrated suburban tragedy "In the Bedroom," wrote the screenplay for "Little Children" in collaboration with Perrotta, so the original author had a chance to oversee his vision. The film's milieu and its trip into the dark underbelly of modern life recall the similar setting and theme of 1999's "American Beauty," minus the hallucinogenic reveries and overheated caricature. Because of its more realistic tone, "Little Children" may be the more disquieting of the two movies. Title aside, it's not kid stuff.


	Tuesday, April 23, 2024





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