Movie review: 'Somewhere Between'.. | The Salt Lake Tribune

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The tepid documentary "Somewhere Between" shows that when it comes to asking deep questions, maybe it's not best to ask teenage girls for the answers.

Director Linda Goldstein Knowlton ("The World According to Sesame Street") follows four American teens from different parts of the country who have one central thing in common: All four were born in China, abandoned in orphanages due to China's "One Child" policy and adopted by American parents. The four girls live typically American lives, but all struggle with identity issues — feeling neither fully American nor fully Chinese, and asking questions about their birth mothers.

Knowlton focuses less on the girls' unique traits and more on their common threads, spending too much time following some of them on a European trip with an international group for adopted Chinese girls.

The film shows the girls as reassuringly normal, which is good for their psyches but not particularly exciting to movie audiences.

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'Somewhere Between'

Opens Friday, Nov. 30, at the Tower Theatre; not rated, but probably PG for mild language; 88 minutes.

Movie review: 'Somewhere Between' follows Chinese-born American girls