Synopsis:
Ellen Gulden (Renee Zellweger) is an ambitious New York journalist who returns home to care for her mother, Kate (Meryl Streep), who has terminal cancer, at the demand of her father, George (William Hurt), an English professor. Taking a sabbatical from her job, she is dropped into the complexities of her parents' daily existence and gets to know them as she has never known them before, not only as loving parents but as very human, flawed adults. On the inside of her mother's domestic circle of cake-baking, Christmas tree-decorating club women, she uncovers a wise, passionate, amazingly strong woman whom she always underestimated. Meanwhile, deep within her father's intimidating genius and success, she discovers secrets and betrayals that reveal his poignant and vulnerable humanity. Through it all, Ellen, the savvy investigative reporter, probes what she has long avoided: the meaning of love, that one true thing, within and beyond the family.