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Movies / On DVD / My Life Without Me
My Life Without Me

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My Life Without Me (2003)

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65 %
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Reviews Counted:100

Fresh:65

Rotten:35

Average Rating:6.3/10

Consensus: Sarah Polley keeps this production afloat with her moving performance.

Runtime: 1 hr 46 mins

Genre: Dramas

Synopsis: Ann is 23, she has 2 daughters, a husband who spends more time unemployed than working, a mother who hates the world, a father who has spent the last ten years in jail, a strange predilection for... Ann is 23, she has 2 daughters, a husband who spends more time unemployed than working, a mother who hates the world, a father who has spent the last ten years in jail, a strange predilection for the audio-books of soap operas and a job as a night janitor in a university she could never go to in the dayime. They live in a trailer on the yard of her mother’s house, on the outskirts of Vancouver. However, this gray existence changes completely when, after a medical check-up, a shy doctor tells her that she has very little time left, hardly two months to live. Ann decides to keep her condition a secret, not to tell anybody, not even her husband. She doesn't want people around her with long faces mumbling the word "death." She starts to make a list of "things to do before dying" which she completes little by little. The list goes from "saying exactly what I think" to "getting fake fingernails." Unexpectedly, Ann discovers an appetite for life that drives her to live her last days with a sensual and furious intensity she had not known before. During that time she prepares her daughters life without her, meets a solitary wounded man who she seduces (and paradoxically brings back to life), and faces what remains of her life with a courage she never knew she had. -- © Sony Pictures Classics [More]

Starring: Sarah Polley, Mark Ruffalo, Scott Speedman, Leonor Watling

Starring: Sarah Polley, Mark Ruffalo, Scott Speedman, Leonor Watling, Deborah Harry, Amanda Plummer, Maria De Medeiros

Director: Isabel Coixet

Director: Isabel Coixet
Screenwriter: Isabel Coixet
Producer: Esther Garcia, Gordon McLennan
Studio: Sony Pictures Classics

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Reviews for My Life Without Me

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1 - 20 (sorted by comments; UK critics are listed first)
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N/R

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Full Review Source: Guardian [UK] | comment Comment
01/15/04
Guardian [UK]
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

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Full Review Source: Empire Magazine | comment Comment
12/30/06
Empire Magazine
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N/R

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Full Review Source: Time Out | comment Comment
02/09/06
Derek Adams
Derek Adams
Time Out
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

Coixet's dignified, heartfelt little indie drama proves that dying young doesn't always come with the schmaltz of a Julia Roberts movie. Outstanding.

Full Review Source: BBC | comment Comment
11/05/03
Jamie Russell
Jamie Russell
BBC
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

My Life Without Me is an impressively acted, uplifting, thoughtful film that transcends its seemingly depressing subject matter. Highly recommended.

Full Review Source: ViewLondon | comment Comment
10/26/03
Matthew Turner
Matthew Turner
ViewLondon

While the subject matter sounds morbid and depressing, the film is anything but! It vibrates with real life rhythms of speech and relationships

Full Review Source: Shadows on the Wall | comment Comment
09/04/03
Rich Cline
Rich Cline
Shadows on the Wall

Life constantly rises above the mundane, mainly because there's so much that's incredibly touching and believable about Polley's character.

Full Review Source: E! Online | comment Comment
09/26/03
E! Online
Top Critic Icon Top Critic
N/R

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Full Review Source: Boston Phoenix | comment Comment
10/11/03
Boston Phoenix
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N/R

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Full Review Source: St. Louis Post-Dispatch | comment Comment
11/07/03
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
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N/R

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Full Review Source: Houston Chronicle | comment Comment
07/21/05
Houston Chronicle
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

The performances are determinedly low-key, and Ms. Coixet directs even the most charged scenes in a cool, almost affectless style. But the implicit narcissism of the film's title is embraced without really being examined.

Full Review Source: New York Times | comment Comment
09/26/03
A.O. Scott
A.O. Scott
New York Times
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

[A] truly inspiring cinematic achievement.

Full Review Source: New York Observer | comment Comment
10/08/03
Andrew Sarris
Andrew Sarris
New York Observer

Sarah Polley's performance is exquisite, with shades of complexity flickering across her face as she absorbs the information her doctor has given her: confusion, disbelief, then determination.

Full Review Source: FilmStew.com | comment Comment
09/29/03
Annlee Ellingson
Annlee Ellingson
FilmStew.com

Click to read the article

Full Review Source: Movie Gazette | comment Comment
11/07/03
Anton Bitel
Anton Bitel
Movie Gazette

Sarah Polley shoots another movie in the foot with her ice-queen demeanour

Full Review Source: Film Freak Central | comment Comment
09/05/03
Bill Chambers
Bill Chambers
Film Freak Central

A gigantically amoral cliche of a film.

Full Review Source: european-films.net | comment Comment
04/01/07
Boyd van Hoeij
Boyd van Hoeij
european-films.net

Polley wipes herself of all intelligence and beauty for the role, and almost all emotion; her lack of affect is both frustrating and somehow fitting.

Full Review Source: eye WEEKLY | comment Comment
10/01/03
Catharine Tunnacliffe
Catharine Tunnacliffe
eye WEEKLY

My Life Without Me is essentially the same old Hollywood eyewash about the noble mother suffering silently for the sake of her children, it's about as phony and manipulative as a movie could be.

Full Review Source: Salon.com | comment Comment
09/28/03
Charles Taylor
Charles Taylor
Salon.com

Makes you think twice about what's really important in life and a movie that can do that is a movie worth seeing.

Full Review Source: TheMovieChicks.com | comment Comment
10/24/03
Cherryl Dawson and Leigh Ann Palone
Cherryl Dawson and Leigh Ann Palone
TheMovieChicks.com

A movie that is spare, candid and beautiful in every detail.

Full Review Source: St. Paul Pioneer Press | comment Comment
10/24/03
Chris Hewitt (St. Paul)
Chris Hewitt (St. Paul)
St. Paul Pioneer Press
 
 
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