text: Imagine a film the complete opposite of Lawrence of Arabia, instead of having an all male cast, it has an all female cast. Instead of being set in the barren deserts of Arabia, it is set in the bulging metropolis of New York City. And instead of it being one of the greatest films ever made, it is one of the most pointless, boring and forgettable.<br /><br />The film concerns Mary Haines (Meg Ryan) a perfect wife and mother, the envy of all others in her high society Manhatten social circle. She is painted as a women bearing the weight of the world on her shoulders, despite the fact she needs a live in nanny and housekeeper to cope with her one child. But I don't want to be too hard on her, Mary does all this whilst taking a liassez-faire attitude towards the fashion designing job her father has given her. This idyllic lifestyle cannot last forever though and things start to crash in a very real way.<br /><br />Mary's husband is cheating on her and her father fires her for not working hard enough. She is quite naturally upset and breaks down a little.<br /><br />Mary needs to bounce back though, for the sake of her impressionable young daughter and for herself. She does this through rehab, hair straightening and designing her own line of clothes; though amazingly for this kind of film, not a montage. Mary succeeds; her daughter loves her, her mother loves her, her friends love her and her husband decides he loves her now. She decides to take her cheating husband back after realising it was her fault he cheated, as she didn't dote on him enough.<br /><br />The films one saving grace is that it doesn't go down the "all men are evil" route.