Dan in Real Life

Review By: Michael Dance
michaelmdance@gmail.com

I suppose it's a little pedestrian to simply call a movie "nice", but that's what Dan in Real Life is. It's a really nice little movie. Good-hearted, warm, unpretentious - it's all of those things. That last adjective proves to be particularly important, given the current crop of movies that have Oscars and politics on their minds.

Though the weak TV ads would have you believe Dan in Real Life is about nothing more than Steve Carell being a wacky dad to three daughters, it actually has a plot. A widower, Dan takes his daughters up to Rhode Island for the annual Thanksgiving family reunion. His first morning there, he meets Marie (Juliette Binoche) at a bookstore; they chat for a couple of hours and he gets her number. Then he goes back home to realize that she's actually the new girlfriend of his brother Mitch (Dane Cook).

That's it. The stakes are purposely low; Dan obviously wants Marie for himself, but he also has a good relationship with his brother, who has had a lot of girlfriends but seems to really like this one. No one's the villain; no one even did anything wrong. What's Dan supposed to do?

The pleasure of the movie is the genuine family atmosphere it creates (with John Mahoney and Dianne Wiest leading the clan as Dan's parents). Aunts, fathers, grandkids, and the rest all inhabit the many rooms of the (gigantic) lake house, and they all actually look like they know each other and - more importantly - enjoy each other's company. There's not an unlikable one in the lot, and as such we enjoy our time spent with them as they do group crosswords, play touch football games, and even perform a mini talent show. None of these "activities" seem gimmicky, but rather like things a family does out of tradition. And again, because they genuinely enjoy them.

Casting here is crucial. Dan seems like a part that was written for Carell, who excels at playing a simple, lonely guy. Overplaying the role would've been disastrous. Binoche, the French actress from Chocolat and The English Patient, seems like an unconventional choice at first, but she proves to be a lovely (and remarkably age-appropriate at 43) love interest.

I'm happy to report that Cook is also excellent. A lot of critics seem to hate the guy in general, and it's understandable why: his energetic (and in my opinion often hilarious) standup act has somehow segued into a film career full of some of the blandest roles seen by man. Here, things are different. He plays the role of the younger, hipper brother (which, like Carell's role, seems tailor-made for his strengths) in the most unaffected fashion, letting us see Mitch's failings and insecurities - a completely honest performance that makes both the actor and the ...