My Life Without Me Explained

My Life Without Me
Director:Isabel Coixet
Screenplay:Isabel Coixet
Music:Alfonso Vilallonga
Cinematography:Jean-Claude Larrieu
Editing:Lisa Robison
Distributor:Sony Pictures Classics
Runtime:106 minutes
Language:English
Budget:$2.5 million [1]
Gross:$12.3 million [2]

My Life Without Me is a 2003 Canadian drama film directed by Isabel Coixet and starring Sarah Polley, Mark Ruffalo, Scott Speedman, and Leonor Watling. Based on the 1997 short story collection Pretending the Bed Is a Raft by Nanci Kincaid, it tells a story of a 23-year-old woman, with a husband and two daughters, who finds out she is going to die soon. The film is an El Deseo and My Life Productions co-production.[3]

Plot

Ann is a hard-working 23-year-old mother with two young daughters, an unemployed husband, a mother who sees her life as a failure, and a jailed father whom she has not seen for ten years. Her life changes dramatically when, during a medical checkup following a collapse, she is diagnosed with metastatic ovarian cancer and told that she has only two months to live.

Deciding not to tell anyone of her condition and using the cover of anemia, Ann makes a list of things to do before she dies.[4] She decides to change her hair, record birthday messages for the girls for every year until they're 18, and tries to set up her husband with another woman.

Feeling a longing to experience a life that was never available to her, she seeks out a man to experience how it feels to be in a sexual relationship with someone other than her husband. Her experiment ends up taking an emotional toll when she meets with a man named Lee, who ends up madly in love with her and is left heartbroken when Ann breaks it off with him. He meets with her one last time and says that he will do anything to make her happy, taking care of her daughters and even finding her husband a new job. She ends their relationship and never tells him that she is dying.

At the end of the film, Ann records a message to her husband, telling him that she loves him, and another one to Lee, telling him the same. She then leaves all tapes that she has recorded with her doctor, asking him to deliver them after her death.

Cast

Reception

Box office

The film was released on September 26, 2003 and ran for 12 weeks. It grossed $400,948 in the USA and $9,326,006 from markets in other countries, for a worldwide total of $9,726,954.

Critical response

My Life Without Me received generally positive reviews from film critics. Review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reports a 65% approval rating, with an average rating of 6.32/10, based on 100 reviews. The site's consensus reads: "Sarah Polley keeps this production afloat with her moving performance".[5] Metacritic, another review aggregator, gives the film an average score of 57/100 based on 31 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews".[6]

Plot of this film is very similar to No Sad Songs for Me (1951, dir. Rudolph Maté), based on the novel by Ruth Southard (New York, 1944).

Accolades

The film won many international and festival awards, including the Genie Award for Best Actress (Polley), the Goya Award for Best Adapted Screenplay (Coixet), and Best Song ("Humans Like You" by Chop Suey).

AwardDate of ceremonyCategoryRecipient(s)Result
European Film Awards6 December 2003Best FilmIsabel Coixet[7]
Best Director
Genie Awards1 May 2004Best ActressSarah Polley[8]
Goya Awards31 January 2004Best FilmIsabel Coixet[9] [10]
Best Director
Best Adapted Screenplay
Best ActressSarah Polley
Best Original SongChop Suey
Vancouver Film Critics Circle2003Best Actress in a Canadian FilmSarah Polley[11]

See also

External links

Notes and References

  1. Web site: My Life Without Me. Jan 14, 2020. www.imdb.com.
  2. Web site: My Life Without Me (2003) - Financial Information. The Numbers. Jan 14, 2020.
  3. News: Isabel Coixet narra el triunfo después de la muerte en su película 'La vida sin mí'. El País. 4 March 2003. Aurora. Intxausti.
  4. Web site: https://web.archive.org/web/20160316153420/http://sonyclassics.com/mylifewithoutme. 2016-03-16. My Life Without Me. sonyclassics.com. dead. 2016-08-14.
  5. Web site: My Life Without Me (2003). Rotten Tomatoes. November 21, 2019.
  6. Web site: My Life Without Me Reviews. Metacritic. CBS Interactive. November 21, 2019.
  7. Web site: Marks for 'Lenin' . Dawtrey . Adam . 7 November 2003 . 4 May 2018 . Variety.
  8. Web site: Barbarian Invasions is gem of Genies . The Canadian Press . The Canadian Press . 2 May 2004 . 21 April 2017 . The Globe and Mail.
  9. Web site: Spain's Goya Award nominations announced . Green . Jennifer . 10 December 2003 . 21 April 2017 . Screen Daily.
  10. Web site: Take My Eyes takes Spanish prize . Green . Jennifer . 1 February 2004 . 21 April 2017 . Screen Daily.
  11. News: Lost in Translation wins big . Spaner . David . 5 February 2004 . The Province . Vancouver, B.C. . B.5 .