lark-10 This movie has great promise but falls apart. The performances are excellent but what the actors had to work with is questionable. About a quarter of the way thru the movie the characters begin to behave in ways that are undeveloped, unexplained and unattached seemingly to the rest of the movie. It's almost as if they each start to act in a movie of their own. Weaver's character is particularly at fault. In addition there are events that are unexplained - one example of several is when the thing happens to Weaver with the black women it is never made clear how it happened. Maybe we don't need to be told and are expected to draw our own conclusions but why isn't her husband told? All up, very disappointing.

dbdumonteil There are movies which are absorbing just because there are actors who are able to transcend an academic directing :Sigourney Weaver is part of them ,and she gets fine support from the whole cast (with the eventual exceptions of the two lawyers ,two cardboard characters,and some of the jail inmates)."Crime and punishment" would be another apt title for "map" :that's the book the heroine claims (along with Laura Ingalls Wilder's "little house",a return to childhood's kingdom,"Walnut Grove" being another world like the one she drew on her map) when she's in jail.Sigourney Weaver portrays a woman with a strong guilty feeling because of two events in her life (one minor with a pupil,another one,quite tragic).When she's unfairly charged with abuse,she accepts the punishment.When she's in jail,she's beaming,and nobody really understands her.More,she still thinks it's not enough (the self-inflicted wounds are revealing).It takes all Weaver's talent to make this complex character credible .Moore's evolution makes sense as well.She too feels guilty and her behavior does not shock."Map" tells a story which concerns us all: Its core is responsibility. Recommended.

marlasingers This film was such an amazing concept; a fantastic lead role for a female actress. I have no qualms with Weaver or Moore in this film but I do with the director.This film had a lot of potential to explore what happens when a person undergoes life-altering experiences in a short period of time, whether it is due to a situation that is within or out of their control. Throughout the film, the character was on the edge of greatness, and yet it never quite happened. There were at least 4 moments in the film that were headed this way but the viewer simply ends up feeling like it was all an anti-climax.It is a shame, but perhaps a similar film will be made in the near future where the themes explored in this film actually reward both the viewer & do the characters justice.

BillSchillaci This intense film vacillates with mixed results between personal drama and pushing your face into the hellish task of being parents. Although a good actor and still with a great body, Signourney Weaver is too old for the role. She also seems too intelligent for the chaos that seems to control her life. After she is imprisoned, hints are dropped that there is something deeper and darker about her than we know about. This turns out to be a red herring and an unsatisfying one at that. One gets the same feeling about Chloe Sevigny's character -- that there's something else about her we need to see, but the filmmakers can't figure out how to show it. Well constructed individual scenes and committed acting make this film watchable, but, in the end, oddly unfulfilling.