Pausing briefly from romantic comedies in which she snaps at lazy oafs until they fall in love with her, Katherine Heigl will revisit the relatively softer, weepier side she once displayed on Grey’s Anatomy by returning to television in the HBO film The Knitting Circle. An adaptation of Ann Hood’s 2007 novel of the same name, the movie stars Heigl as a mother who seeks solace after the death of her 5-year-old daughter by joining a knitting circle, only to find that all of her fellow knitters are also there to cope with their own personal tragedies. Comparisons to the recent Rabbit Hole are a given—particularly as that film seemed to do wonders for rehabilitating Nicole Kidman’s growing reputation for being brittle and plastic, and Heigl is suffering from her own similar, self-acknowledged, stuffed-bunny-kicking image problems. If Heigl can’t shrilly complain her way to your affections, you lazy oafish Americans, maybe she can at least get some sympathy.
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