Mom before the storm
When Jennifer Garner’s marriage to Ben Affleck was falling apart last year, she was shooting the faith-based, family values film Miracles from Heaven.
In the midst of the domestic upheaval, producer Joe Roth says that he sat down with Garner at one point: “I told her, ‘If you don’t want to do (Miracles from Heaven), I understand.’ ”
It turns out the resilient mother of three decided to finish what she started.
The film in question is loosely based on Christy Beam’s heart- rending memoir, Miracles from Heaven: A Little Girl, Her Journey to Heaven, and Her Amazing Story of Healing. Garner plays Christy, the determined mother who never gives up on finding help for her 12-year-old daughter Anna ( played by Kylie Rogers). The girl suffers from an intestinal pseudo- obstruction mobility disorder that doesn’t allow her to digest food so she has to use feeding tubes for nutrition.
Subsequently, Anna’s condition is reversed after a bad fall, but the movie mostly focuses on the harrowing ordeal of finding a specialist to help her.
Co-headlining with Garner is Grey’s Anatomy’s Martin Henderson, who plays Christy’s loyal husband Kevin. Queen Latifah also makes an appearance for some comic relief as Anna’s new friend. But it is Garner’s performance that counts as the emotional centre of the film.
Director Patricia Riggen confirms that the essence of Miracles from Heaven arrives with the actress’s dedicated definition of a mom who refuses to give up despite many obstacles.
“She was very brave,” says Riggen of Garner. “There were a lot of difficult scenes and she went there with the pain that was raw.”
Thespian vanity wasn’t a Garner motivation, however.
“Saying ‘ yes’ to this was all about honouring Kevin and Christy’s experiences,” says the 43-year-old.
As an involved mother, the actress admits that she didn’t “have to reach deep” to connect with the portrayal of her movie mom. But to put a fine point on the impact of the disease, Garner and Rogers visited adolescent patients suffering from the intestinal syndrome at an Atlanta, Ga., children’s hospital.
“You don’t have to be a mom ( to relate) because there’s no greater need than a doctor when you need a doctor,” Garner says.
For more practical purposes, Kevin and Christy visited the Atlanta sets from their Burleson, Texas home during filming last summer. It provided extra incentive for the cast, especially for Garner, who says she was inspired by Christy’s presence.
“We were l ucky to have Christy on set,” she says. “It was wonderful because of who she is. She was only there to encourage. She’s not a judgmental person. It was like having a cheat sheet for every scene.”
When they were available, the actors asked Kevin and Christy everything from how the parents take their coffee to family nicknames to the “really deep stuff.”
Overall, Garner says that she’s pleased with the final results of the movie, which underscores “the universality” of a faith-based family.
The aftermath of making Miracles from Heaven had a more personal impact.
“I grew up going to church every single Sunday,” Garner says. “I was a vacation bible schoolgirl. And Ben and I took our three kids to my West Virginia church to be baptized, each individually. But church was something that my kids went to when we were at their grandparents’ house ( in Charleston, W. Va.), not when we were at home in L.A.”
That changed after Miracles from Heaven wrapped. Garner and her children now attend the closest Methodist Church to their house. “So that was a gift,” she says.
So does the actress believe in miracles?
“I truly believe that there are miracles all around us,” says Garner, who paraphrases Albert Einstein’s quote from the film, “You can believe nothing is a miracle or everything is a miracle.”
Meanwhile, she’s back to her mothering ways in her next movie, The Tribes of Palos Verdes, although her latest mom role is more dysfunctional than devout.
And that’s OK with Garner. So is the fact that she has added a string of mothers to her recent cinematic CV.
She was mom in the fantasy The Odd Life of Timothy Green, the comedy-drama Men, Women & Children, the farce Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day and the darkly funny profile Danny Collins.
“I was a mom for a long time before I started playing mothers,” says Garner. “It’s one of the windows in my career that finally matches my age.”
‘ THERE WERE A LOT OF DIFFICULT SCENES AND SHE WENT THERE WITH THE PAIN THAT WAS RAW’