Genre: Drama
Cast: Sean Penn, Michelle Pfeiffer, Dakota Fanning, Dianna Weist, Loretta Devine, Richard Schiff, Laura Dern, Brad J. Silverman, Joseph Rosenberg, Stanley DeSantis.
Running time: 2 hours. 12 minutes
Director: Jessie Nelson
Released: 2001
Rating: PG 13
In this drama packed film stars Sean Penn as Sam Dawson, who is a developmentally disabled adult who at the time is earning a living by working at a small Starbucks serving coffee and is raising his seven year old daughter Lucy (Dakota Fanning) who were both abandoned by the homeless mother as soon as they left the hospital.

Same is given a lot of help from his close group of friends which include his ADD afflicted best fried Lfty (Doug Hutchison), the paranoid Robert (Stanley DeSantis), his loyal neighbour Annie (Dianna Weist) and his other disabled pals such as Brad and Joe who are played by Brad Silverman and Joseph Rosenberg, who are actually real life developmentally challenged.

Even though Sam tries his utter hardest to provide Lucy with a life like everybody else that surrounds her by having Beatles Karaoke nights with all of Sam’s friends along with video game nights and regular visits to their favourite diner, IHOP. Sam’s daughter is starting to outgrow Sam’s brain capability, as she is nearly eight years old, and is holding back from her true potential in fear that she will out smart him and people will doubt his ability to take care of her. A social worker Margaret (Loretta Devine) takes notice of the situation and quickly takes actions by taking Lucy out of her home and placing her into the care of a foster mother (Laura Dern). As the day of Sams hearing is soon to arrive he desperately seeks out help from the work obsessive lawyer, Rita Harrison (Michelle Pfeiffer) who only takes the case to show that she is willing to take a probono case. Rita gradually comes to warm up and start truly caring about Sam and his daughter Lucy even though they seem to cross the line about her own parenting ability. Along the way of helping her case, Sam shows her that there is more to