THE SAVAGES. Dir Tamara Jenkins. 2007

Image result for movie images the savages laura linney

Pitch perfect. Laura Linney and Philip Seymour Hoffman play a brother and sister (Wendy and Jon) with some distance between them. Both writers, he is a college professor specializing in Brecht, she is an aspiring playwright. Both are uneasy about their childhood and have put it behind them, until a crisis recalls them to their estranged father. They have to care for him when he had never cared much for them.

Seen from Wendy's viewpoint, she reacts emotionally, tries to do the right thing and feels guilty, while Jon takes a practical line, refusing to make a fuss about any of it, which she misinterprets as a callous attitude. It reveals an interesting difference in approaches to the elderly, and his calm, reasoned approach seems the more effective. When Wendy agonizes about how to ask their father what they should do in the event of his unconsciousness or 'possible' death, their father shouts 'Pull the plug! Bury me!' as though they are idiots.

Now and again, brother and sister regress into competitive bickering which is funny and excruciating at the same time and, for a moment, the viewpoint switches into that of their father, giving a sense of his desire to escape from them. From the dessicated and claustrophobic retirement village 'Sun City' to the messy apartments and slightly messy lives of the siblings, the whole film is excellent, realistic and funny.

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