I hope we've all learned by now to be wary of movies in which a white person learns a Very Important Lesson About Life from someone of another race. It was hokey in Driving Miss Daisy, it was unbearable in The Soloist, and I expect it to be pretty silly in that upcoming Sandra Bullock movie about the family that adopts the black football player. Because, come on. Standing back and marveling that "we're all the same on the inside" is the oldest kind of Hollywood pandering to racial equality, and is still de riguer in an industry that rarely gives leading roles to non-white actors and still can't find another decent part for Viola Davis to play.

Anyway. I'm obviously not 100% certain that the new Reese Witherspoon project Rule #1, written by Terrel Seltzer, is that kind of movie, but it sure sounds like it-- "a New York woman befriends a Puerto Rican girl with attention deficit disorder," as THR describes it. Witherspoon, who hasn't actually been seen onscreen all year (she lent a voice to Monsters vs. Aliens though) is set to star and produce. I like Witherspoon and I'm really, really rooting for this to be something beyond the usual tripe about learning lessons; someone please give me something to look forward to here.

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