Mr Wonderful

Writer/director Minghella's second feature brings ambivalence and a touch of realpolitik to the stuff of candyfloss romance as it charts the relationship between New York electrical worker Gus (Dillon) and his former wife Lee (Sciorra). Having achieved her long-suppressed wish to go to college, she's now the recipient of maintenance payments from her financially strapped ex-husband. If he could find someone to marry her pronto, it would solve all his money problems and let him pursue his new flame Rita (Parker) - but where to find such a Mr Wonderful? The answer, of course, is staring him in the mirror each morning, but the awkward corners of these emotional lives refuse to be subjugated within conventional movie plotting. Against an assured Italian-American background, Dillon adeptly conveys the inarticulate longings and confusion of a repairman who can't fix his own life, and the film's generosity of spirit is touching in itself.