Dan In Real Life (8/10)
posted in Movie Reviews |
While this movie doesn’t break much new ground, it’s solid enough to be entertaining, thanks largely to the talented cast.
Writing: Written and directed by Peter Hedges, who had previous written and directed the great independent movie Pieces Of April, the story revolves around family. Unlike Pieces Of April, this is an openly warm and loving family. It’s kinda the opposite approach from Pieces, where you had a love story amidst a family that begrudgingly shows affection to each other. Like I said, nothing here you haven’t seen in another film (I was particularly reminded of the recent Family Stone), but it works all the same.
Production: The production is very straight forward. Nothing stylized or flashy here. This is a movie that’s about character development, where the production just stays out of the way and lets the cast and writing take center stage.
Cast: Here’s the real strong suit of the film. Steve Carell is excellent, of course. He’s certainly funny, but he down plays the comedic aspects and focuses more on the dramatic aspects of the performance. He definitely gives it a great everyman vibe. Juliette Binoche is a somewhat unexpected bit of casting, but she works well enough. Dane Cook is one of those actors who doesn’t have too much by way of varied acting skill, but he’s fine when given the right type of role. This is one of those roles. Other supporting roles are well cast. John Mahoney and Dianne Wiest work well as the parents. The the girls they cast do a fine job as the daughters. Brittany Robertson does perhaps a bit too good a job with the teenage girl histrionics.
Music: Norwegian folk singer Sondre Lerche is somebody I had zero familiarity with before looking up his credit as composer on this film. This is apparently his first film score (and his only as of yet). I remember little about the score beyond it being simplistic and average enough.
