(from a review by Jon Bastian)
Drowning Mona is a lot like watching an episode of Wheel of Fortune, if you're a fan. You may root and cheer and laugh while the game is on, but half an hour later, you won't remember the solution to the big money puzzle. It's a shame, because the film is full of great actors playing incredibly well defined and minutely observed characters. By the final credits, though, the plot twists and character bits fall a few turns short of being satisfying.
First, a few words on what Drowning Mona is not, ad campaigns to the contrary. It is not a Bette Midler star vehicle. In fact, despite Ms. M. playing the titular drownee, she isn't in the film nearly enough. In the far too few scenes in which we see her play a shrill, nasty, zaftig, white trash harridan, she steals the show -- and it's no stretch at all to imagine why anyone (or everyone) would want to kill her -- which brings me to the second point. Much is made in the film's advertising that the entire population of the small town of Verplanck, New York, wants to Mona dead. In reality, there are far too few suspects, and that is the main point on which the movie falls down. The solution to the mystery is rather obvious, despite a big fat red herring planted about midway, and so the resolution feels unfulfilling. It's kind of like going to Verplanck's only diner expecting the "heart attack special" and only getting the vegetarian plate.
