I can understand why the feedback on this movie is so bad - if you see it just once, it is hard to pick up on all the small details that pull this movie together very nicely. Katherine Healy in real life is a professional ice-dancer (skater), which is why you probably never saw her in another movie - she actually had to pretend she didn't really know how to skate in the scene at the ice rink at Rockefeller Center. On the whole, I thought she did the part extremely well, having no other movie credits under her belt. Dudley Moore and Mary Tyler Moore worked very well together and it was even better that they did not get romantically involved, but kept it on the surface. Had this happened, it would have ruined the whole innocence portrayed throughout this movie and taken the focus off the main theme and that is of little Nikki (Healy) who is dying of leukemia, and I'm certain the makers of this film were well aware of this. Healy's performance in the Nutcracker is nothing short of perfection. Dudley Moore portrays a seriousness with some humor that pokes through at the right moments. Mary Tyler Moore also seems very well suited for the role of Nikki's mother, the cosmetics tycoon Charlotte Dreyfus, who does her best to hold her emotions in check for Nikki's sake. I have the video and view it occasionally and always pick up on something else that ties it altogether. Like one of the viewers said, you have to go back after awhile and give it another look.
Review of Six Weeks
