It becomes obvious that she deeply admires George, a once-celebrated novelist and literature professor at Princeton University, but Ellen has barely restrained disdain for her mother, Kate, and the domestic life she lives.

She realizes she always brushed her mother aside and idealized her father, despite his self-centered focus on his career and, she discovers, a longtime habit of having flings with his female students.

Ellen attempts to find a place for herself in her parents' life while struggling to continue writing on a freelance basis and maintain her relationship with her boyfriend in New York.

Ellen also learns that her father's philandering days have become lonely nights of drinking at a local bar to numb the pain of never again achieving success with, nor even being able to complete, further novels.

One True Thing received mostly favorable reviews from critics, with Streep being the subject of acclaim for bringing warmth and natural energy instead of appearing cold and technical.

[6] Audiences surveyed by CinemaScore gave the film a grade "A" on a scale of A to F.[7] Todd McCarthy of Variety called it "sensitively written, fluidly directed and expertly acted.

[9] Mick LaSalle in the San Francisco Chronicle declared, "After One True Thing, critics who persist in the fiction that Streep is a cold and technical actress will need to get their heads examined.

"[11] Among the few negative reviews, Salon.com's Andrew O'Hehir complained that the movie "really has no plot", and found director Carl Franklin unable to properly connect with his cast.