Julianne Moore has found her calling: playing ’50s housewives.
In Far From Heaven, she plays a depressed housewife living in the 1950s whose husband turns out to be gay. In The Hours, she plays a depressed housewife living in the 1950s whose husband turns out to be John Reilly.
In The Prize Winner of Defiance Ohio, Moore plays Evelyn Ryan, a (wait for it) cheerful housewife living in the 1950s, whose husband turns out to be an alcoholic Woody Harrelson. Based on the memoir by Evelyn’s daughter Terry, Prizewinner is about a woman who supports her 10 children by winning various jingle contests, but unlike the other Moore films, Prizewinner has a uniquely charming honesty.
Although Ryan endures the indignities of poverty, motherhood and marriage to a loveable, yet worthless bum, she lets her life become neither maudlin nor farcical. Evelyn occupies herself by entering contests, which we see through montages accompanied by plucky music. She uses her good luck and advertising savvy to win washers and driers, shopping sprees and ponies for her struggling household.
Credit is due to writer and director Jane Anderson, who keeps the sickly-sweetness in check. A film about an optimistic housewife who supports her family of 10 by winning prizes could be truly annoying, but Anderson keeps it sweet without being too syrupy, and true-to-life without being too gritty.
Sometimes the picture is a little too bright visually; a darker look would have provided a nice contrast to the all the cheer.
The brightness does cross the line into being sappy toward the end, with a heart-to-heart between Evelyn and the teenage Terry. But by that point Anderson has earned the right to implement a little cheesiness.
Julianne Moore is an undeniably skilled actress, yet it is still shocking how great she is in Prizewinner. While the delicate, mournful characters she plays in Far From Heaven and The Hours are poetic and symbolic, Evelyn Ryan is a real woman. It has to do both with Evelyn’s basis in real life and with Moore’s confident and personable performance. Harrelson, likewise, plays Evelyn’s husband Kelly with such standoffish warmth that the character works in perfect opposition to Evelyn.
Moore’s portrayal is what makes this film worth watching, though. Evelyn Ryan is unwaveringly happy, often stretched too thin, but always has a serene understanding of how to keep her family running (an amalgamation of Bree and Lynette for those who require a “Desperate Housewives” analogy). Prizewinner is a movie about a person more than a premise. A film with a less capable lead actress would cause this charming story to lose its potency. Moore makes an otherwise light and cute film engaging and genuine. m
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