Jon is an emotionally stunted professor. His sister Wendy is an emotional wreck and both are charged with looking after their ailing disinterested father who develops dementia. Sound appealing?
The problem with this film is not so much the bleakness of the topic, it's more that it lacks a sense of direction. It wildly dips into the wells of emotion associated with such a traumatic situation yet without actually cementing any empathy into the characters themselves.
Jon (Philip Seymour Hoffman) is cold and aloof. His no nonsense practicality leads him to incarcerate his father into an austere, unfeeling nursing home without a single tear yet he cries over his girlfriend's fried eggs. These random bursts of emotion seem almost incongruous at times and fail to highlight Jon's emotional vulnerability.
Meanwhile Wendy (Laura Linney) overcompensates for her brother's lack of feeling by being an emotional cyclone. She jumps from one disaster to another whilst downing prescription drugs and lying to those around her. Even their demented father, Lenny Savage (Philip Bosco) shows more lucidity than her as he dreamily watches the world go by.
With raw, unguarded footage, theirs is a world of brutal isolation, a topic that perhaps should have been explored further. Cold and unfriendly, the family must cope with the realisation that the responsibility of looking after their father within an uncaring, clinical environment is a burden that offers no solace in the arms of strangers.
Although the film intends to paint a darkly humourous view on dementia, it fails to illuminate the pressure of this disease on modern day families. Instead we are left with a bitter taste in our mouths and a slight feeling of disappointment as the characters bump along the road without actually going anywhere.
Two stars out of five
Feeds