I am Sam - PG-13\nStarring: Sean Penn, Michelle Pfeiffer\nDirected by: Jessie Nelson\nShowing: Showplace East 11\nSomewhere in "I Am Sam" there is a very compelling story. There is a story of a man with the intellectual capacity of a 7-year-old, and the struggles he faces raising his daughter. There is a story of a girl who will be smarter than her father by the time she gets to first grade, and the difficulties she will face in school and at home knowing that Daddy is "different" These two stories are played out in the film's first 35 minutes, at which point the filmmakers chose to abandon them in favor of a courtroom drama. It was an unfortunate decision, because it turned a very insightful and touching film into a frustrating yawner. \nSean Penn plays Sam Dawson, a man with a lower than normal IQ who is forced to take care of a daughter all by himself when the child's mother runs away just after she is born. It is later explained in the film that the mother was a homeless woman who just wanted a place to sleep. Sam raises Lucy (named after the Beatles' song) as best he can, and tries to operate under the advice of the Beatles: All you need is love. But while he has more than enough love, he does not always have the intelligence required to raise a child himself.\nGood intentions and a loving heart are not substitutes for food and a good place to sleep. But instead of showing all of these problems and how he and his daughter deal with them, the movie takes the easy way out by having lawyers and witnesses discuss how they feel Sam will deal with them.\nSean Penn does an outstanding job in this role, but unlike Tom Hanks in "Forrest Gump" or Dustin Hoffman in "Rain Man," Penn is not surrounded by great writers, directors or actors. That makes it difficult for his talent to really be appreciated, and it was frustrating to see a great performance go to waste. It was also frustrating to sit through a film that chose to fill its soundtrack with poorly done remakes of great Beatles songs.\n
){kind=small}
\n
