Clean (2006)

Maggie Cheung plays Emily, the junkie wife of a once-brilliant rock star working on a comeback. Most of the people in their professional life consider Emily to be the "problem" -- the "what went wrong" in her husband's career. So, when he dies of an overdose and she gets thrown in jail for possession, no one's surprised and there's no one waiting for her on the other side.

Despite apparently showing little interest in her son, being raised by her late husband's parents in Canada (one of whom is Nick Nolte, doing a nice job as grandpa), he becomes the reason for her to attempt to pull herself together. The bulk of the film focuses on her attempts to get her life on track in the hopes that she can prove herself worthy of having a place in her son's life.

It's an interesting choice to make Emily, for the most part, annoying. Any goodwill shown her is generally given out of respect for her husband or her family or for a former co-worker. She's coasting on coattails. It's a fearless performance, but I was pretty glad when the movie ended, so I could finally be done spending time with her.

B-