Helen Hunt Filmography Part 16: Ensembles

Helen Hunt makes the most of small parts in a couple of ensemble films from the early 2000s.

Helen Hunt was in a couple of ensemble movies in the aughts. This is a tough genre to get right. With a large cast of characters, someone–or everyone–gets underdeveloped. In each movie I found myself wishing some story lines had been cut to give better attention to more interesting ones.

Empire Falls (2005)

Helen Hunt is great, but she’s a minor character.

Overall I have a few critiques…

All the attempts at Maine accents are a little off. They drop in and out rather inconsistently, and end up sounding like an affectation. 

Having Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward in a movie together and giving them minimal individual screen time and almost no shared screen time is a travesty. 

Although this two part mini-series does have more time to develop the characters, the stories are filtered through one main character, Miles Roby (Ed Harris). And he is the least interesting person in the movie. It’s a case of mediocre white man syndrome. 

More interesting characters to focus on would be:

Grace Roby (Robin Wright Penn)-- the hard working mother who sacrifices her happiness for her son.

Francine Whiting (Joanne Woodward)– the girl who went from low-class, to the top of the social order, and lost her husband to another woman and her child to a horrible accident, and who uses other people’s need for love to manipulate them to serve her. 

Cindy Whiting (Kate Burton)– the girl who was horribly injured as a child and grows to a woman and tries to escape her mother and turn the pity of Miles Roby into love

Janine Roby (Helen Hunt)– who never got the love she needed and deserved from Miles, who tries to build a new life for herself against all the critical expectations of her family, who wants to be a good mother and a happy woman. 

Charlie Mayne (Phillip Seymore Hoffman)– the dissatisfied rich man who nearly bucks the conventions and expectations of his family and class, but never quite can. 

John Voss (Lou Taylor Pucci)-- the impoverished boy who falls through the cracks of society and chooses violence. 

Max Roby (Paul Newman)–the deadbeat, drifter dad, who can’t settle down. Generally not an interesting character type, but it’s Paul Newman, so I’m making an exception. 

Bobby (2006)

This ensemble piece follows the people at the Ambassador Hotel the night that Bobby Kennedy was assassinated. 

In the 1960s Bobby Kennedy inspired the country to hope. He carried the weight of the unfulfilled legacies of both his brother and Martin Luther King Jr. With his vision for a country whose greatness is its compassion, his campaign brought together people across racial, social, and gender barriers. 

In 2023 it’s shocking to hear the clips from his campaign and speeches. It’s impossible to imagine a politician today campaigning on the premise of love and compassion and the goal of mutual flourishing. 

These are some of the characters and story intersection I found most interesting:

Samantha/Jack (Helen Hunt/Martin Sheen)--obviously.  As a wealthy middle-aged couple who financially support the campaign, their story is small, but sweet. They teeter on the verge of losing themselves and their togetherness, but choose Note: If your wife asks you if style-wise she’s more an Ethel or a Jackie Kennedy, she wants you to say Jackie. 

Jose/Miguel/Edward (Freddy Rodriguez/Jacob Vargas/Laurence Fishburne)-- The dynamics in the hotel kitchen are among the most interesting. The Hispanic/Black struggle to not be the most oppressed minority in a white society. 

Diane/William (Lindsey Lohan/Elijah Wood)- The young couple getting married, not for love, but to get William a deferment on Vietnam. The sadness of a generation that has seen so many friends, classmates, brothers, come back dead or destroyed by a war they don’t believe in. To them Bobby is their hope for an end to the death of their generation. 

Miriam/Virginia (Sharon Stone/Demi Moore)-- the hairdresser and the celebrity who are trying to hang on to their dignity and identity in the face of the expectations of those around them. 

Wade/Dwayne (Joshua Jackson/Nick Cannon)- The campaign staffers who believe deeply in the promise of Bobby. 

Nelson/John (Harry Belafonte/Anthony Hopkins) the old friends, and former hotel employees who feel more at home in the hotel than at home. They are more than the old guard making way for the new era that Bobby represents. They still seek to find purpose and not be left behind. 

The least interesting characters are the two campaign aides (Shia LeBeuf, and ?) who slack off and get high on LSD with Ashton Kutcher. Watching people get high in a movie is the equivalent to listening to someone tell you the awesome dream they had last night—it’s kind of boring. 

These characters are the least impacted by the promise of Bobby, and almost every minute with them feels wasted.

I was surprised how much I liked this movie, but I loved it.