On paper, Stephen Daldry's adaptation of Michael Cunningham's immensely acclaimed novel had everything going against it, reeking of Hollywood prestige job tailor-made for Oscar season - and its nine nominations only seemed to underscore it. In practice, however, Daldry and writer David Hare have made a stellar job of translating the novel's defiantly literary devices into film. Cunningham's book applied the central device of Virginia Woolf?s novel "Mrs. Dalloway" - a woman's whole life condensed and allegorized into one single day - to three alternately told stories: that of Woolf herself as she begins writing the novel in 1923, that of a depressed 1951 L. A. housewife who begins reading it, and that of a 2001 NY book editor nicknamed "Mrs. Dalloway" by the now-dying love of her life. Subtly, sensibly and stylishly drawing the parallels through the three stories by purely cinematic means, stage veteran Daldry signs here an immense leap forward from his debut feature "Billy Elliot" and manages to transcend the prestige job façade, turning "The Hours" into an elegantly told, melancholy melodrama about sorrow and loss, for its three central characters all mourn something they have lost irredeemably but still yearn to recover with all their forces "the history of who they once where". Meryl Streep (the editor), Julianne Moore (the housewife) and Nicole Kidman (Woolf) are all stellar and ably backed by a wonderful supporting cast (full marks for the reverse typecasting of Ed Harris and Jeff Daniels), while Philip Glass's lushly romantic minimalist score underlines the film's intensity and passion. We'd be so much better off if all prestige jobs were as good as this.
