Julianne Moore is my favorite actress, but even her presence, could not make this movie work for me. It is watchable, and there sparklings of ideas and some good acting but overall the movie leaves and impression of some not-very good mozaic that has not been glued together well. I am sure some psychologists will explain this movie better than I do, but it does look like the study of depression vs more serious mental illnesses. In this movie these more serious illnesses are associated with more creative people, and lead to suicides, while depression does not, -which strikes as an oversimplified view. Moreover, acting-wise how much more unhappy and suicidal does J. Moore look, which is masochistically much more pleasurable as well! Also, I am not sure, but where is the art in this movie? You take any family and make a similar connection to some cultural icon and make a movie out it, in this movie its Virginia Wolf, why this specific author, because of some lesbian undertones, this still does not make the connection between heroines more special? I partially watched this movie because of the Oscar-buzz and performance by N. Kidman, and she is great actress, and at moments - I could forget that Wolf is Kidman, but overall; nevertheless, I thought she had had better roles and better performances (The Others), and it is questionable if she has a leading role in the movie...
