Bonneville

NEW YORK (CNS) -- If it had nothing else to offer, "Bonneville" (SenArt/Drop of Water) -- which has been awaiting release since 2006 -- provides a chance to see three fine actresses at the top of their game.

It tells the touching story of Arvilla Holden (Jessica Lange), a Pocatello, Idaho, widow, disconsolate after losing Joe, her husband of 20 years. Before she can take stock of her new life, alone, Francine (Christine Baranski), her grown stepdaughter, shows up callously asking for her father's ashes so they can be interred in California next to her late mother.

Arvilla is in a quandary as Joe had specifically requested that his ashes be scattered.

Realizing the insistent Francine has some claim to them, and fearing Francine's threat to evict her from the house she shared with her husband -- Francine's by right, since Joe neglected to revise his will -- Arvilla decides to hand-deliver the urn.

Accompanying her are two loyal girlfriends, gregarious Margene (Kathy Bates) and prim Carol (Joan Allen). along for moral support. Arvilla arranged for them to miss their intended flight so they could instead drive all the way in her 1966 Bonneville, stopping off at the places that had emotional significance to her and Joe, including Utah's Bonneville Salt Flats and Bryce Canyon.

The journey eventually gives her clarity. Along the way to Santa Barbara, the gals come to a better understanding of each other and themselves, helped in that regard by various enlightening encounters. They meet Emmett, a gentlemanly widower trucker (Tom Skerritt) who takes a shine to Margene, and young Bo (Victor Rasuk), who's journeying to meet the father he never knew and helps them when they get a flat tire in the Salt Flats. There's also an amusing stopover in Las Vegas.

First-time feature director Christopher Rowley -- working from a sensitive script by Daniel D. Davis, who apparently based the story on his grandmother and her friends -- sustains a gentle and easygoing, but not dull, tone throughout what is essentially a mature "chick flick" road movie.

The friendship is beautifully dramatized, and there's an affectingly spiritual -- if not specifically Catholic -- quality throughout in the healthy approach to dealing with death. The ladies happen to be Mormon, with Carol the most pious of the lot, as she dutifully recites grace before meals ("See how sweet she is when God's listening," observes Margene impishly) and offers hitcher Bo -- of whom she had been initially wary -- her copy of the Book of Mormon when he parts from them.

Needless to say, the dispersal-of-ashes theme, around which the paper-thin plot hinges, is outside the Catholic tradition, but cultural differences notwithstanding, the urn and its contents are treated with surpassing respect throughout.

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The film includes a few instances of crass language, light violence and brief innuendo. The USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is A-II -- adults and adolescents. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is PG -- parental guidance suggested. Some material may not be suitable for children.

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Copyright (c) 2007 Catholic News Service/U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops