Mired in self-loathing, Drew Baylor has just watched his career take a quick trip down crap highway. Delaying his own ingenious suicide, he must fly to Elizabethtown, Kentucky to pick up his recently deceased father and return him to Portland and his waiting mother. Along the way he meets a stewardess who will change his life: She'll give him direction, a reason to laugh and even give him his wings.

Not since Magnolia as an entire cast contributed so much to a film with such power and meaning that it makes you want to stop and re-evaluate exactly what it is you're doing with your life. I can finally look at Orlando Bloom, who plays Drew Baylor, and not think of him as Legolas from the Lord of the Rings. Kirsten Dunst (Clarie Colburn) is always fascinating and gets to really step out to show her quirky side. Susan Sarandon, whom I loathe beyond all belief, as Drew's Mother -- Hollie, steals the show with an eccentric performance worthy of an Oscar nod. And of course there's Bruce 'Jack Dalton' McGill as Bill Banyon for all you MacGyver fans out there.

There is nothing typical about this film, even though it sticks within the framework of a romantic comedy. You start low, you go lower and you end high and somewhere along the way, you fall in love. It is really a shining example of what can happen when you get quality writers and actors together to tell a story that actually means something. I think that the difference is in the writing. Cameron Crowe (writer/director) has filled the film with wonderful symbolism, wry wit and oh yeah, high pitch squealing. Even if you don't catch on to some of it right away, it will come back days later to hit you. (I just hope you're not driving or operating heavy machinery when it happens!)

This is a film about redemption; it's about turning hell into heaven and about inner demons and angels. This isn't a story about real life, it doesn't have believable characters, instead it takes one piece of the human psyche and expands on it and exaggerates it to its highest form and then shows us what that could be. The film is powerful, I felt different after watching it, better. I can't say that about a lot of films and I think that most people who see it will feel the same.

Elizabethtown opens nationwide October 14th

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Dave can be reached at dkerr@detroitbuzz.com .