17-year-old Lisa feels certain that she inadvertently played a role in causing a traffic accident that claimed a woman's life. In her attempts to set things right, she meets with opposition at every step. Torn apart with frustration, she begins emotionally brutalizing her family, her friends, her teachers, and, most of all, herself. She has been confronted quite unexpectedly with a basic truth: that her youthful ideals are on a collision course with the realities and compromises of the adult world.
Acting
Anna Paquin's volcanic, unsympathetic descent is raw nerve personified.
Writing
Lonergan's dialogue weaponizes intelligence against itself.
Editing
Three-hour cut battles itself—chaos that mirrors Lisa's unraveling.
Director
Kenneth Lonergan
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Lonergan's contractual three-hour cut was buried by studio battles for six years; the 'extended' version is actually his original vision.
The title references a Gerard Manley Hopkins poem about a girl whose death moves no one—lonely foreshadowing of Lisa's futile crusade.
US
