It is important as we get older "to discover and energize different parts of ourselves," poet James Dickey once stated.
In Unhook the Stars, Gena Rowlands plays Mildred, a middle-aged suburban widow who finds herself at a transition point in her life when her rebellious daughter (Moira Kelly) leaves home.
Monica (Marisa Tomei), a working-class neighbor, asks Mildred to look after her six-year-old son J.J. (Jake Loyd). The little boy lights up her life and becomes her best friend.
Monica then introduces Mildred to Big Tommy (Gerard Depardieu), a truck driver who takes a fancy to her. In addition, Mildred's son (David Sherrill) wants her to move in with him so she can presumably take care of the child he and his wife are expecting soon.
Written and directed by Nick Cassavetes, Unhook the Stars is a psychologically rich drama about the fortuitous events in a woman's life which propel her to reinvent herself. Having spent years taking care of others, she is now ready to taste the intoxicating spiritual elixir of freedom.
In a moment of jubilation in the last scene, Mildred shows she is ready to see what's on the other side of the mountain.