HELLO, MY NAME IS DORIS (****1/2)

(2015) Doris (Sally Field) has, to say the least, led a sheltered life.  In her sixties, she lives on Staten Island with her ailing mother (who has just passed away), making the long commute into Manhattan every day where she works a low-level job in the accounting department of a big company.  Doris hangs out with her best friend Roz (Tyne Daly), mostly attending self-help seminars, and lives in a house packed with stuff (having learned to hoard from her mother).  It's shortly after the death of her mother that a lonely Doris attends an evening seminar lead by a guru-like speaker (Peter Gallagher) who convinces her life is only worth living if you go for what you want most ... which is why Doris decides to romantically go after the much younger-man in her office, John (Max Greenfield), whom she's developed quite a crush on.  Thankfully, the lead role of Doris was put into the more-than-capable hands of Sally Field; whereas another actor might have made Doris come off pathetic or even creepy, Field gives Doris the exact-right blend of humor, dignity and pathos that will have you both empathizing with her plight and even wanting her to succeed.  It's a flawless performance that makes Doris a character anyone can relate to who has ever found themselves lonely and single and unsure of where to go from there.  Funny, sweet, flawed, and wholly human a character as has ever graced a movie screen, thanks to the incomparable Sally Field in a lovely, lovely film.  (rated R)