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Editorial Review:
Amazon.com essential video:
Based on Anna Quindlen's bestselling novel, this is a mother-daughter and father-daughter story, two for the price of one. But director Carl Franklin also tries to inject a police-mystery angle that it neither needs nor will support. Renee Zellweger plays a young writer on the rise, who has finally gotten her break for a New York magazine. While home for a birthday party for her nearly famous writer father (William Hurt), she learns that her mother (Meryl Streep) has been diagnosed with cancer. Then her father does the unthinkable: He all but commands her to put her career on hold to take care of her mother and nurse her through her illness. Dad, a popular college professor who has never gotten the literary acclaim he always believed he deserved, essentially checks out--and daughter must play parent to her mother. Strong performances by Streep and Zellweger give this parent-child relationship the heart--and the anger--of the real thing, while Hurt seems slightly disembodied as the self-involved father whose needs have dominated both women. Still, the detective-story aspect (the film is told in flashback, as the cops try to discover whether someone slipped Mom a fatal dose of morphine) is a construct that could have been done without. --Marshall Fine
Customer Reviews
Average Rating: 
Rating:  - One of the few Movies that relate to real life.
Great movie. I was immensely disturbed towards the end. Especially when the scene where the mother talks with her daughter about why she still loves her father even though she knows everything about him. Here's a line I will remember for a long time - "There is so much to be happy about what you have...". At the same time, I was angry at the father who in my opinion did not understand his wife's love for him. He was too proud. Even on the night when he was sitting drunk in a bar while his wife is ... Read More
Rating: - a moving film that you won't soon forget...
One True Thing tells the touching and sensitive story of how a young woman (Ellen Gulden, played by Renée Zellweger) comes to understand her parents and their relationship with each other when a crisis strikes the family. The acting is superb; and the cast is full of top-notch actors: Ellen's mother Kate Gulden is played by Meryl Streep; and Kate's father George Gulden is played by William Hurt. Look also for a fine performance by Tom Everett Scott as Ellen's brother Brian Gulden.
When ... Read More
Rating: - A good one
I drag this out whenever I need a good cry. I don't know why it just hits me so hard, EVERY time. I guess I see myself in the daughter and the appreciation that grows for her mother, who reminds me of my own who passed a few years ago. The story, characters, acting... all amazing. My absolute favorite tear-jerker of all time.
Rating: - One True Thing - great movie!
I teach a Death & Dying Class at a University and I use this film. It gives a different perspective on "suicide" and the family dynamics of a person who is dying.
Rating:  - One True Thing
Meryl Streep's character was real. I was not impressed with Renee Zellweger's performance at times. I saw too many "Bridget Jones' Diaryisms" in her facial expressions when dealing with serious issues. I would still (very much) recommend this movie. A serious role played by Meryl Streep is generally a beautiful thing to witness.
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