Sherrybaby

This credible but slightly unbalanced film shows us a mother's desperate attempts to win her daughter's love after she served a stint in prison. In an Oscar worthy performance Maggie Gynllenhall takes the lead as the drug addicted mother who finds it hard to go straight after her pre-prison life of drink and drugs threatens to revisit her. However, she is desperate to get a job working with children (something she manages to land after performing sex favours to authority figures). Something with the film doesn't quite fit, though this may be down not to lack of story, but the indecisive way the script hovers around awkward points. Still, this is far from a failure, with some touching moments of acting from both the lead and supporting cast.