Strangely, not one of the Steve Martin movies that spring to mind often, "A Simple Twist of Fate" seems to hit all the right notes. Tragic circumstances leave Martin embittered and reclusive until an orphaned child walks into his life. Cue the rehumanization process. Sure, it's a Hollywood movie, so the kid's gotta be adorable, but it's effective storytelling nonetheless. The movie grinds to a halt when the second half becomes a custody battle; I've never read Silas Marner, but you just know with that sentimental score, everything will somehow turn out right. The courtroom drama just feels drawn out.But at its heart, this is about a man and his little girl, and that hits me where I live.7/10

When facing losing your child in the court system, a parent suffers a roller-coaster of emotions.Here, two wannabe fathers are fighting for their parental rights to a daughter.One father had been highly regarded in the community and had unbounded political ambitions.The other father was a town drunk and miser who lived on the land of the other father.The movie is suspenseful at times, dark at times, light at times, and has a great ending.

As we all know, the real book, "Silas Marner" was first published in 1861 by "George Eliot". Well, in the time the book was published, women weren't "supposed" to write books like this. George Eliot's real name is Mary Ann Evans 1819-1880. Her understanding of the "Human condition" and the effects of loneliness on a person are greatly adapted into the book. If you read the novel, even though the wording of the book is different than modern English, well... that's part of the charm of the book. It takes you into a time when that's how they spoke. When considering the era of the book, and once again the adaptation of the movie "A Simple Twist of Fate", I believe that Steve Martin did an excellent job. Although... there's no substitution for the original work.

"A Simple Twist of Fate" is a decent dramatic-comedy, but some good potential was missed.Steve Martin plays a quiet and lonely man who doesn't like people, and who lives for one thing only: His money collection. But one night it is stolen by one of the many Baldwin brothers, who disappears into the night. But new hope for Martin arises when a dead mother's child shows up on the doorstep (or IN the house for that matter) at Martin's; he takes her in after the frozen-to-death mother is shoveled off the driveway with a steamroller (no, no, I'm joking). But later, the town's richest man admits that the girl is his...after she is about twelve and is everything to Martin. Now Martin must fight to keep his adopted daughter. The judge says without money for college, Martin won't be able to keep the girl. So his only hope is to find the money that was stolen from him all those years ago."A Simple Twist of Fate" is a decent film, with a few laughs, but it's about a half hour too long and doesn't contain quite enough laughs. It's pretty sad when Catherine O'Hara generates more laughs in the film than Steve Martin himself.Martin does well, but there is no explanation as to some of his quick character changes. I understand the girl changes his life and turns him from a private person to a social person, but it's not a gradual change: One day he is a man who hides in his cabin all day, the next day he's a regular Joe saying "Hi" to everyone in town. Gabriel Byrne plays the real father of the girl, and he does pretty well (though it's not his most fondly remembered co-star role).Catherine O'Hara, as I said before, delivered more laughs than the hilarious Steve Martin, which makes me wonder if the director wanted to give Martin a new "look" so to speak. Unfortunately, I like the old Martin better.In the end, "A Simple Twist of Fate" is a pretty decent comedy/drama that I watch whenever it comes on TV, but I'd never buy it. Worth seeing once or twice.3/5 stars -John Ulmer