Sliding Doors

1998 Comedy Drama

British actor Peter Howitt wrote and directed this British romantic comedy-drama with a "road not taken" premise recalling the 1921 play +If by Lord Dunsany (1878-1957), Frank Capra's It's a Wonderful Life (1946), and O.Henry's short story Roads of Destiny (1909). Howitt's storyline branches in two directions: Helen (Gwyneth Paltrow) loses her job at a classy London PR firm, has a run-in with a purse-snatcher, and just misses catching her boyfriend Gerry (John Lynch) in bed with his former girlfriend Lydia (Jeanne Tripplehorn). But what if it were one of those days when everything goes right? As the sliding doors close while she stands on a subway platform in the London underground, Helen ponders the events in her alternate reality. The plot of Lord Dunsany's +If also hinges on a future determined by catching or missing a train. Sliding Doors was shown at the 1998 Sundance Film Festival. more..

Director: Peter Howitt

Starring: Gwyneth Paltrow, John Hannah, John Lynch, Jeanne Tripplehorn, Zara Turner

Reviews

  • The story is hackneyed, and the gimmick only doubles the dullardry.

    - Entertainment Weekly

    27 April 2013

  • You're hooked enough to keep watching, even if the characterizations veer toward the two-dimensional.

    Jay Carr - The Boston Globe

    27 April 2013

  • Sound tricky? It is, and all a little too cutely so, the switches back and forth between realities ever more contrived and eventually tiresome, prompting giggles of relief as the storylines painfully draw towards a soap operatic convergence.

    Angie Errigo - Empire

    27 April 2013

  • As we switched relentlessly back and forth between A and B, I found that I wasn't looking forward to either story.

    Roger Ebert - The Chicago Sun-Times

    27 April 2013

  • No doubt this seeming effortlessness was hard-won. Movies this smooth don't happen by accident.

    Mick LaSalle - The San Francisco Chronicle

    27 April 2013

Awards

  • Sydney Pollack

    BAFTA Awards (1999)

     
  • Best British Director

    Empire Awards, UK (1999)

  • Best Screenwriter

    European Film Awards (1998)

  • Best Actress

    Florida Film Critics Circle Awards (1999)

  • Best Foreign Actress

    Russian Guild of Film Critics (1998)