‘Daughter’ a Sensitive Look at Love, Acceptance

The things “A Soldier’s Daughter Never Cries” does best are as difficult to describe as to accomplish. Somehow, against considerable obstacles, it has captured something true about families and friendship, creating a texture of believable emotions on screen. To watch this touching story of a young girl’s coming of age is to feel that someone felt this, someone cared about it, and someone understood how to translate it into film.

“Soldier’s Daughter” is based on an autobiographical novel by Kaylie Jones that deals with her own experiences growing up in Paris and the United States in the ‘60s as the daughter of celebrated novelist James Jones (“From Here to Eternity,” “The Thin Red Line”).

Behind the scenes is the veteran team of producer Ismail Merchant, director and co-screenwriter James Ivory and his writing partner Ruth Prawer Jhabvala, whose successes include “A Room With a View,” “Howards End” and “The Remains of the Day.”

Except for that latter film, the 20th century has not been the most fertile ground for the respected Merchant Ivory group, who have stumbled with modern efforts like “Slaves of New York” and “Surviving Picasso.” But this film is for the most part different, a positive exercise whose missteps are not fatal to the general spirit of acceptance and love.

The key here may be the personal connection co-writer and American director Ivory, who has also led an expatriate life, apparently felt to several aspects of the material, a linkage that led to a measured empathy that resists excess.

What results is a memory piece with a very loose and fluid form, a series of three sketches from childhood whose main dramatic focus is watching a young girl move uncertainly toward maturity. This has been attempted before, and more than once, but “Soldier’s Daughter” manages to get under the skin in unpredictable ways.

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The film’s final success is especially unexpected because “Soldier’s Daughter” is the kind of film that starts awkwardly but picks up assurance as it goes along. In fact, its first section, “Billy,” comes off as its rockiest and most confusing.

For one thing, the introduction of writer Bill Willis (Kris Kristofferson), his passionate wife Marcella (a spirited Barbara Hershey) and their expatriate life of jazzy parties and lusty poker games feels initially phony and too broadly drawn.

Also, the plot of this first section, involving the decision by the Willises to adopt a small French boy named Benoit, is filled with so many confusing aspects it’s no wonder that the family’s natural daughter Channe outright rejects the new addition at first.

But the film shows its integrity in the gradual way Channe comes to accept the boy, who changes his name to Billy and as a young man (Jesse Bradford) becomes especially close to his sister.

The teenage Channe is played by Leelee Sobieski, a remarkably poised young actress last seen in “Deep Impact” and soon to be in Stanley Kubrick’s “Eyes Wide Shut.” It’s not a coincidence that the film gains impact in the final two segments, both named after other pivotal men in Channe’s life.

The first of those is called “Francis,” after Paul Francis Fortescue (beautifully played by Anthony Roth Costanza), a flamboyant young man whose close teenage friendship with Channe is threatened when she starts to take a romantic interest in other boys. Again, the awkwardness and entanglements of those years is tricky material to handle well, but Ivory, who’s said that in creating this character “I sometimes drew on myself,” knows how to make it valid.

“Daddy,” the namesake of the final section, figures more in Channe’s life when the Willises move back to America partly because of her father’s concern over the onset of hereditary heart disease.

Though the film’s title makes it sound as if World War II veteran Bill Willis were a disciplinarian and a hard case, in fact the opposite is true. Firm but kindly and an invariable source of excellent advice, especially where boyfriends are concerned, the senior Willis comes off as the father we’d all like to have had. His daughter’s tribute to him, the rest of her family and herself is fond and clear-eyed, and, by all indications here, well-deserved.

* MPAA rating: R, for language. Times guidelines: references to sexual activity.

‘A Soldier’s Daughter Never Cries’

Kris Kristofferson: Bill Willis

Barbara Hershey: Marcella Willis

Leelee Sobieski: Channe Willis

Jane Birkin: Mrs. Fortescue

Dominique Blanc: Candida

Jesse Bradford: Billy Willis

Virginie Ledoyen: Billy’s mother

Anthony Roth Costanza: Francis Fortescue

A Merchant Ivory Productions production, in association with October Films, Capitol Films, British Screen, released by October Films. Director James Ivory. Producer Ismail Merchant. Executive producers Richard Hawley, Nayeem Hafitzka. Screenplay James Ivory & Ruth Prawer Jhabvala, based on the novel by Kaylie Jones. Cinematographer Jean-Marc Fabre. Editor Noelle Boisson. Costumes Carol Ramsey. Music Richard Robbins. Production design Jacques Bufnoir, Pat Garner. Sound Ludovi Henault. Running time: 2 hours, 4 minutes.

* Playing selected theaters.