Hope Floats

Hope Floats is a 1998 American romantic drama film directed by Forest Whitaker and starring Sandra Bullock, Harry Connick, Jr., and Gena Rowlands.

Birdee (Bullock) is an unassuming housewife whose life is disrupted when her husband (Michael Pare) reveals his infidelity to her on a Ricki Lake-style talk show. She goes home to her mother (Rowlands) and the small town in which she grew up, where everyone knows of her televised marital collapse. Things only get worse as a family tragedy brings her ex-husband back for an official divorce. Meanwhile, an old friend, Justin (Connick, Jr.), has entered her life, sparking a romance. While Justin's intentions are clear and good, Birdee struggles with the decision to let him fully into her life.

Plot

Birdee Pruitt (Sandra Bullock) is a Chicago housewife who is invited onto a talk show under the pretense of getting a free makeover but instead is ambushed with the revelation that her husband Bill has been having an affair with her best friend Connie. Humiliated on national television, Birdee and her daughter Bernice (Mae Whitman) move back to Birdee's hometown of Smithville, Texas, with Birdee's eccentric mother Ramona (Gena Rowlands) to make a fresh start. As Birdee and Bernice leave Chicago, Birdee gives Bernice a letter from her father, telling Bernice how much he misses her.

Hope Floats: Music from the Motion Picture

Hope Floats: Music From the Motion Picture is the soundtrack to the 1998 film Hope Floats. It was released by Capitol Records on April 7, 1998, featuring 13 tracks by country and pop singers. That year, the album reached #4 on The Billboard 200 and #1 on Top Country Albums. It is certified double-platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) for U.S. shipments of two million copies.

Content

One cut from the album, Garth Brooks' rendition of "To Make You Feel My Love," reached No. 1 on the Billboard country singles charts in August 1998. This song also appeared on a re-release of Brooks's 1995 album Fresh Horses which was included in his 1998 box set The Limited Series.

The Bob Seger-Martina McBride duet "Chances Are" peaked at No. 23 on the Billboard Hot Adult Contemporary Tracks chart in 1998.Lila McCann's "To Get Me to You" was also released as a radio single, but did not chart. Paul Davis's 1981 single "Cool Night," which reached No. 11 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1981, is also included on the album.