Written by David Hare and based on Michael Cunningham's novel, The Hours traces and interweaves the lives of three women: Virginia Woolf (Nicole Kidman) during the writing of Mrs. Dalloway in 1923, a housewife (Julianne Moore) reading the finished book in 1951 and contemplating suicide, and a modern - day woman (Meryl Streep) who cares for
her ailing poet friend (Ed Harris) and throws him a party, just like Dalloway does in the book.