Michael Bianchi There is something painfully dark and disturbing about this movie - a film about a waitress (duh) that becomes pregnant by her abusive husband and begins an affair with her gynecologist - that bothered me from the time I stopped watching it. It wasn't the husband, who was so cartoonishly evil that he removed any emotional punch of the abuse storyline as he played less like an actual person than a method actor in the midst of a very poor production of A Streetcar Named Desire. Nor was it the tired trope of women cheating for reasons that humanizes and makes us understand them while men do it because . . . well, men cheat. (The lead character's husband is abusive and selfish in bed - of course - and her coworker's affair is justified by her husband being in a vegetative state and sleeping in a separate room. Both of the men they have affairs with have blameless, wonderful wives they are apparently happily married to.) Nor even the implication that the only good thing a man can do is die as the only major male character not abjectly terrible serves as a deus ex machina who manages to write our saintly heroine an enormous check before having the courtesy to kick the bucket and not be seen again.No, actually, those tropes don't bother me because I could as easily point to a zillion zany guy comedies where women are shrewish, joyless nags or soulless objects of desire who appear long enough to showcase either their fronts or rears and then return to the factory floor to be pulled for the next showcase. It would by hypocritical to find my moral outrage for that.What is uniquely ugly about this film is a device wherein a woman appears in several scenes with her unruly, awful, out-of-control 6-year-old boy - who spends every second of screen time ruthlessly tormenting his poor mother. These are meant to show what Waitress fears about childbirth - and it is apparently having a boy. The implication seems to be strongly that had she not gotten her 'happy' ending of having a girl in the film's climax, she would have simply remained miserable.It is a gross hatred of boys, an equivalent I couldn't imagine in another film. Men are not awful, this film says, because of a patriarchal society that indoctrinates them. It is not the actions of her awful husband or the philandering doctor that ruin a woman's life, but the mere act of being born with a penis. I think the 'pro-life' message so many Christian conservatives are finding in this film would not exist if they did not imply early and often her child would be a girl. I wonder if the writer/director of this film was going through a rough spot in her marriage when writing this? Working out feelings about her father? I read before her tragic death she had a daughter . . . and thank god for that, because I would worry even more about the implications if she'd actually had a son. (I hope, if she did, this aspect would've changed.)Ultimately this disgusting aspect drags a mediocre film with a couple of lights to a level that makes it, well, kind of awful.

adi_2002 The story is simple. A waitress has an abusive husband and she get's pregnant and goes to the local doctor for consultation and she falls in love with him and between them begins a love romance.I'm truly amazed by the high rating. I don't say it's a bad movie just that is simple and nothing too fancy about it. Just the drama of an ordinary American woman and her daily routines at work and at home. Also we are not told why her husband has this vile behavior for his wife, in fact what she ever do to him that deserves this treatment? There a many movies with mystery in witch a review is hard to write because after you watched you still don't get it, even if you watch more then once but here is not the case so I still think is a too appreciate film for it's trite content. If you are bored in one afternoon and you are in the mood to watch a story life, this is a good pick, but that's all.

SnoopyStyle Jenna Hunterson (Keri Russell) is a pie shop waitress who makes amazing pies with strange names. She is dismayed that her husband Earl (Jeremy Sisto) got her pregnant. He's a controlling, obnoxious, and demeaning. Her best friends are her fellow waitresses Becky (Cheryl Hines) and Dawn (Adrienne Shelly). The owner of the pie shop is Old Joe (Andy Griffith). She's trying to save money to run away from Earl. She wants to enter a $25k pie contest in a nearby town but Earl won't permit it. Then she meets the new doctor Jim Pomatter (Nathan Fillion). She falls for him only that he's already married.It's a whimsical movie about slightly quirky characters by Adrienne Shelly. It's really sad that she got murdered. She showed herself to be an interesting emerging filmmaker. It's more charming rather than laugh out loud funny. The heart of it is the adorably sweet Keri Russell.

Imdbidia The story of a young pie cook and waitress, Jenna (played by gorgeous Keri Russell), who struggles to survive emotionally to the tyranny of a jealous and possessive husband in a small town in southern USA.I did not think it was an independent film worthy of Sundance, --where, however, triumphed--, but rather a Hollywood film. The film has an interesting script, but it's too pretentious as touches too many issues (domestic violence, loneliness, deception, creative cuisine, unwanted pregnancy, the need to escape the village and her husband to have a better life) but none of them deep enough or with enough originality.Several elements deserve praise. Firstly, the culinary part. The food and pastries that Jenna creates are an emotional expression of her daily mood and feelings, and the scenes connected with their preparation are beautifully presented, filmed with intimacy and warmth; it somewhat reminds me of the emotional food story presented in Like Water for Chocolate. Secondly, the relationship(predictable and many times told) between Jenna and the grumpy old man who owns the Cafe where she works, played by a delightful Andy Griffith. Thirdly, the dialogs between the three waitresses and their personal stories, really nice and funny, with that southern accent full of grammatical inaccuracies so charming! Finally, the unloving letters that Jenna writes to her unborn child. Moreover, the film has beautiful colors, a 1950s feeling in it too, and a great cheerfulness, that makes the watching very enjoyable.The three waitresses Keri Russell, Cheryl Hines and Adrienne Shelley) are great in their roles, but are Jeremy Sisto, as the insecure and jealous husband, and Griffith, the ones that really stand out and steal the show.