(Touchstone)
Release date: September 27, 2002
Directed by: Andy Tennant
Starring: Reese Witherspoon, Patrick Dempsey, Josh Lucas, Fred Ward, Mary Kay Place, Ethan Embry, Jean Smart and Candice Bergen

     Sweet Home Alabama is one unflinchingly predictable film. From the minute that rising fashion star Melanie Carmichael (Reese Witherspoon) becomes engaged to Andrew Hennings (Patrick Dempsey), the son of New York’s mayor, Kate (Candice Bergen), it becomes glaringly apparent that the film won’t end with a high society wedding at the Plaza. Of course, the skeleton in Melanie’s closet takes the form of Jake Perry (Josh Lucas), her first love — a man she married right out high school and promptly left back home in Pigeon Creek, Alabama. Jake refuses to divorce Melanie, so she ends up back home trying to convince him to sign the papers that will let her get on with her life.

     Melanie’s picture perfect life unravels once she heads home to secure her divorce and finally leave her past behind only to discover that home is where the heart is — literally. The rest of the movie follows Melanie around as she comes to the glaringly obvious conclusion that her past is more a part of her future than she ever would have realized.

     Director Andy Tennant must take full blame for the film’s potholes. He allows Sweet Home Alabama to drown under mediocre affectations by relying on a script so full of small town stereotypes it’s almost embarrassing. Reese Witherspoon remains the ace in Tennant’s hand; she dazzles on screen and her transformation from mere actress to movie star is one of the reasons to go see Sweet Home Alabama.

     In fact, the entire cast of Sweet Home Alabama does an excellent job with the flimsy material they’ve been handed, from Fred Ward and Mary Kay Place’s sweet performances as Earl and Pearl (yes —– those are really their names), Melanie’s parents, right down to Ethan Embry as the shy Bobby Ray (the token closeted gay man in a small Southern town).