A Dangerous Woman

In this elegant, powerful drama based on a Mary McGarry Morris novel, Debra Winger turns in a performance that deserves a place among the great acting work in recent movie history. If only anyone had seen it. Winger is Martha Horgan, shy, antisocial, incapable of lying. We’re led to think this might get her in trouble with her Aunt Frances (Barbara Hershey) — who’s having an affair with a married politician — but the script has other things in mind. Martha falls in love with drunken handyman Colin Mackey (Gabriel Byrne); meanwhile, her frustration at not being taken seriously builds and builds until it erupts in a convulsion of rage. Winger lets her voice go flat and inexpressive, and director Stephen Gyllenhaal wisely has her do most of her acting with her eyes. When Martha slow-dances with Colin and peers over his shoulder, Winger shows us every microscopic flash of hesitation, fear, self-doubt, love, excitement — within the space of a few seconds. Winger was nominated the same year for Shadowlands, but this is the performance that should have been nominated and won. Byrne, for his part, is rocky and not always sympathetic, and Hershey shines once again under Gyllenhaal’s direction. A remarkable, stupidly overlooked film.

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