Night, Mother (1986)

A woman (Sissy Spacek) who's had an unhappy life lives with her mother (Anne Bancroft) who she takes care of. One night, she calmly organizes her mother's things like which medicine to take and when, folds the laundry, fills the candy dishes with her mother's favorite candies, writes down all the important phone numbers etc. and then tells her mother she's committing suicide. Based on Marsha Norman's (who also did the screenplay) 1983 Pulitzer Prize winning play, this is an unsentimental look at someone in such emotional pain that there are no other options for her and her determined choice to get off the merry go round of her empty life. Only Louis Malle's powerful LE FEU FOLLET exceeds it in its observation of a suicidal personality. Mercifully, Norman and the director Tom Moore (who also directed the play) don't attempt to dilute its strength by opening it up to make it more cinematic. Like WHO'S AFRAID OF VIRGINIA WOOLF?, it all takes place in one night in one set, a house. The parts are equal and both actresses are excellent with Spacek edging a bit past the sometimes actress-y Bancroft with a heartbreaking performance. Spacek shows us every detail of this woman's tormented soul. It's one of her very best performances. The last 20 minutes or so will likely have you in tears but they're not manipulative tears, they come by honestly. Yeah, I guess you could call it a downer but I'd prefer to call it real. David Shire's score may be brief (there's probably less than 10 minutes in the whole film) but what's there is choice.