The Stepford Wives (2004), PG-13

Nicole Kidman and Bette Midler in The Stepford Wives. (Photo: Paramount)

Starring: Nicole Kidman, Matthew Broderick, Bette Midler

Joanna Eberhart thinks she's made it to the top of her world. The youngest president in the history of the EBS television network, she also has an attentive husband and two beautiful children. On the surface, Joanna's life appears to be, well, perfect--until one catastrophic day when it all comes crashing down around her. Fired from her job, her perfect marriage in trouble, unable to remember where her kids go to school, Joanna is starting to look like a candidate for electroshock therapy. Yes, there's nothing like a nervous breakdown to make Joanna and her husband Walter reexamine their priorities, pack up the family and make a fresh start in the idyllic suburban paradise of Stepford, Connecticut. But something strange is happening in the quaint little town of Stepford, and Joanna is suspicious. So is Bobbie Markowitz, who recently moved to town with her irascible frat-boyish husband Dave. And Roger Bannister, an architect who came to Stepford hoping to save his rocky relationship with his conservative partner Jerry, is wondering what is going on too. It's the wives. They're all like Claire Wellington--beautiful, happy and unusually creative with crafts. They can bake a cake, paint the house, mow the lawn, play with the kids and still greet their husbands in lacy lingerie at the end of a busy day. Disturbed by the stunning but subservient women she meets in Stepford, Joanna grows increasingly uneasy. On the other hand, Walter couldn't be happier. He's especially impressed by the Stepford Men's Association, a fortress-like mansion in the center of town. "The town, and the houses, and this place--it's like a dream," enthuses Walter. "Like the way life should be." Until Joanna Eberhart gets in the way.