Product: Prime
Rating: 4.0
Skirting the clichés
A 23-year-old man falls for an "older" (37-year-old) woman whose therapist is the young man's mom. Great potential for cliché, right? "Love conquers all" and all that. But "Prime" treats its audience with a bit of intelligence, providing delightful servings of both drama and comedy. Uma Thurman plays Rafi, a fashion maven whose marriage just fell apart. She bumps into 23-year-old David (played with intelligence and bumbling charm by Bryan Greenberg) at a movie theater. The pair can't take their eyes off each other and are soon a going thing.A couple of mild spoilers: Rafi's spills the beans on her new relationship to her therapist, played with ticky hilarity by Meryl Streep. All is well until it dawns on Streep that Rafi's new paramour is none other than her own son. This much you could glean from the DVD cover. The movie's comedy comes from watching Streep's discomfort as she hears more than she wants to about her kid. But leavening the laughs is the truly serious story of two people wondering whether they are right for each other and whether the age difference can be overcome in spite of the fire of their passion. Greenberg finds the razor's edge to play a David who mature and sensitive --for his age -- but still a kid at heart. Rafi loves her new lover, but wonders about integrating him into her circle of close and quirky friends. David's piggish friend Morris is the perfect comic foil, diverting the excess comic energy from David -- who must remain as serious as he is funny. The movie does not downplay the difficulties of its character's differences and the surprise ending is the perfect topper for this smart, engaging film.