The story is pretty contrived, but it's easy to look past that because it is more about the relationship between the characters instead of the mystery or whatever of a mother being trapped in her daughter's body. It's a film well worth watching for the superb performances from David Duchovny (who has quickly become a huge obsession of mine) and especially Olivia Thirlby who convincingly portrays this adult soul trapped in her teenage body. She was absolutely brilliant and will probably stay in at least my top ten by the end of the year. Even more impressive was the fact that this was actually her first role ever in film, just other stuff got released before it. The two of them were devastating together and worked so well, which is outstanding because of the age difference. They did a great job of moving seamlessly between such a wide range of emotions from sexual repression to jealousy to anger.

This is a remake of a Japanese movie I believe, a drama about a family like every other. The mother and her husband are very much in love, and their 16-years old daughter is going through her teen phase; friends, boyfriends, drugs, anger against parents who love her. This is very hard to live for her mother who only wants her good. One day while they are both in the car arguing, they get in an accident where they both nearly die. When the mother wakes up at the hospital, her daughter is dead. After something strange happens, she awakens in the body of her daughter, and her own body is declared dead.

She doesn't understand what is happening and tries to convince her husband that she is the mother, not the daughter. Obviously, at first the husband doesn't want to believe her, thinking she is still shaken from the accident. Eventually he realizes that she is telling the truth, but even though they are in love as husband and wife just like before, they cannot consume their love as the father finds it awkward to have his wife inside his daughter's body. The situation is very hard on both of them as they are so close yet so far.

During the movie, the mother tries to continue her daughter's life in hope that she will one day re-emerge. This brings conflict to the relation between her and the husband, as she feels as if she is re-living her teen years through her daughter's chaotic life. The main actors really brought a lot of emotion to the characters, and their love story even brought tears to my eyes. There are a lot of touching and sad moments. The movie's production feels a little bit cheap but it's a great story told brilliantly. The main actress playing the daughter did an amazing job at conveying the feelings of this adult-teenager girl torn between two lives and so many emotions. Very beautiful movie.

A direct-to-video release in the United States, this French directed film stars Americans and is a remake of a Japanese film called Himitsu. Although the film deals with the supernatural, it is not a J-horror remake. In fact, it's quite a touching and intelligent movie. I think the reason it was never released over here is because it is an intelligent film. The attempts to market it as a thriller, from the title and the video cover, probably wouldn't have worked if it had been released normally. David Duchovny stars as an optometrist whose wife and daughter (Lili Taylor and Olivia Thirlby) get into a serious car accident at the open of the film. His wife passes away in the emergency room, but his daughter survives. As soon as she wakes up, however, she claims not to be the daughter, but the wife trapped in her daughter's body. Smartly, the film doesn't spend too much time with Thirbly's attempts to convince Duchovny – the evidence is overwhelming. The film spends most of its time with the difficulties the peculiar situation raises, especially between the married couple. The two also find evidence, when Thirlby talks in her sleep, that the daughter is still somewhere inside her. They expect she may come back to them one day, but then the wife's personality will disappear. The film is far from perfect. Its best in the small scenes, and worst when director Perez is trying to create set-pieces. You can see the cheapness especially in the emergency room sequence – it looks nothing like an emergency room. The real news here is Olivia Thirlby's performance – her first, if we are to believe the opening credits. And proud this film should be to introduce her – it was obvious enough even in a mediocre film like Juno that Olivia Thirlby was going to be a star. Of the four films I've seen her in so far, this is the best proof that she's a keeper. She plays two different characters, one over twice her own age. The role requires a tour de force performance, and Thirlby delivers one effortlessly.