Turn the River

Famke Janssen, a good actress too often cast in flimsy roles, plays a small-time gambler who gets by hustling poker and pool games in upstate New York. In her periodic jaunts to New York City, she checks in on her tough-love mentor (a cheerfully grizzled Rip Torn in fine form) and secretly sees her son Gulley (Jaymie Dornan), whom she abandoned at birth. Now she plots to scrape together enough money to get Gulley away from his angry, alcoholic dad (Matt Ross) and oppressive grandmother (Lois Smith). Chris Eigeman, who co-starred with Janssen in "The Treatment," turns writer and director with this film. If the script is less than polished, he shows good instincts for character and atmosphere in his directorial debut. And Janssen is convincingly weather-beaten and frayed as the tough cookie who has been bounced around by life, and risks it all to save her son. The DVD features commentary by Eigeman, and "The Final Shot," the raw, uncut footage of Janssen getting into character and then taking the difficult final pool shot in the climactic game – and sinking it in one take.