I love this use of dramatic, moody lighting in Nancy Meyers' remake of The Parent Trap. Overall, The Parent Trap looks, for lack of a better word, like a "normal" movie. But here, when Natasha Richardson's character sees her ex-husband for the first time in years, Meyers and cinematographer Dean Cundey turn up the theatricality. Richardson's face is kept mostly in shadow except for a single shaft of light cutting across it. It's a beautiful example of how expressive use of lighting can externalize a character’s emotion. The shaft of light isn't naturally realistic, but emotionally realistic. It visualizes the shock and emotional weight of seeing someone, you haven't seen in ages, who once meant everything to you. Love when a movie that more or less adopts the principles of realism allows a little stylization to come through at exactly the right moment. This moment would land with much less force if the whole film was stylized.
I like commenting on the lighting, composition, and staging of mainstream films, especially mainstream films targeted toward women, because they rarely receive the same kind of visual analysis that more traditionally "cinephile" films do.