Margaret

What to say about MARGARET, except that it's both a mess and mesmerizing. Overlong and crowded with too many themes, characters, and plots to do most of them justice, it nevertheless rarely feels leaden. You watch hoping it will reach an ending that will make all of its loose ends -- some beautiful and powerful -- connected once more. But no. Director Kenneth Lonergan, whose You Can Count on Me was a lean, mean family drama machine, seems indecisive here, unsure about the kind of movie he's making. Is it a treatise on growing up a teenager in a post-9/11 New York City, or an examination of what guilt and tragedy can do long after the event that precipitates all these disturbing feelings is long gone?

Lucky for Margaret that it has Paquin as its lead. The way she talks and moves captures the roiling mess that are the teenage years. She's able to juggle three emotions -- defiance, ennui, fear -- on her face all at once. And the supportive cast is impressive, especially Jeannie Berlin as a woman beset and enraged by grief. But honestly, what's the point of having marquee names in your movie if you're not going to use them much? (Matthew Broderick as an inexplicable and, as it turns out, unimportant character is a major waste of talent.) Margaret has aspirations of greatness but falls short. That said, it's still sort of fascinating.