This is a ruthless, darkly comic look at a family going through divorce in the 1980s, loosely inspired by Baumbach's own childhood.
Bernard and Joan Berkman (Jeff Daniels, Laura Linney) are both writers; his career's hit a slump and hers is just picking up steam, which may be one of the contributing factors to their separation. Their sons, Walt (Jesse Eisenberg) and Frank (Owen Kline), instantly take sides, Walt siding with Bernard and Frank with Joan. There's no tidy plot or easy summing-up at the end of the movie; we're simply watching a few difficult weeks in the lives of this family.
Jeff Daniels is terrific here, and deserves an Oscar nomination; Bernard is an utterly self-absorbed, pompous jerk, and Daniels never backs away from the character's most appalling traits, or winks at the audience to try and separate himself from Bernard. Daniels is willing to be hated, which I have always believed is one of the things that separates great actors from very good ones. (It's the biggest thing that keeps Tom Hanks, for instance, from ever doing truly great work.)
The rest of the cast, if not quite at the magnificent level Daniels reaches, is also very good; Owen Kline (the son of Kevin Kline and Phoebe Cates) gives as realistic a portrayal of early adolescent confusion as I can remember seeing. The ensemble is rounded out with solid supporting performances from William Baldwin, Anna Paquin, and Halley Feiffer. A fine movie, well worth your time.
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