The coltish Dani becomes smitten with Court, even though he thinks himself too grown up for her. When one arrives, in the form of a handsome teen-age neighbor named Court (Jason London), he affects the girls' family in powerful ways. In his or her own way, each member of this family longs for a boy. The girls' family, which is beautifully evoked, exists at all different stages of development, from their toddler sister to their pregnant mother (Tess Harper) and the father (Sam Waterston) who is wary of his daughters' prospective suitors. The latter, 14-year-old Dani (Reese Witherspoon), is just on the verge of real beauty, while the slightly older Maureen (Emily Warfield) has already gotten there. Mulligan can find something evocative even in the way the elder braids the younger one's hair. Until its final reel, when it strains badly to accommodate an almost biblical stroke of retribution, "The Man in the Moon" is a small, fond film that achieves a kind of quiet perfection. His latest film unfolds gently and gracefully, in a climate where the warmth isn't merely a matter of weather.
Mulligan, a seasoned film maker whose credits include "To Kill a Mockingbird," "Summer of '42" and "The Other," can direct with real tenderness and without fake emotion. Everything about "The Man in the Moon," Robert Mulligan's effortlessly old-fashioned family drama set in a small Southern town, has a rosy glow.
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