Where to begin with This Is Where I Leave You?
Directed by Shawn Levy, the movie's all-star cast includes Jason Bateman, Connie Britton, Rose Byrne, Tina Fey, Jane Fonda, Adam Driver, Kathryn Hahn, Timothy Olyphant, Dax Shepard and Corey Stoll. Based upon Jonathan Tropper's 2009 novel of the same name, it tells the story of four siblings who return to their childhood home after their dad dies. To their surprise, they must honor their father's wishes and remain at home together for seven days while sitting Shiva, the Jewish mourning custom.
The Warner Bros. movie is in theaters today. Here's what the critics are saying:
• The Wall Street Journal's Joe Morgenstern writes, "This is one of those overworked and generally airless comedies with a sitcom premise that can't sustain life." He adds, "Even though most of the family sees the literalism as a bad joke perpetrated by a lifelong atheist, the film...feels truly and authentically interminable." He gives the actors a backhanded compliment, writing, "These are talented people, even though there's little or no chemistry among them, and I don't mind admitting that they made me laugh when I wasn't in mourning myself for the slow, painful death of Hollywood comedy."
• The Los Angeles Times' Betsy Sharkey, meanwhile, thinks the actors worked well together. "I can't think of a family I'd rather sit shiva with than the Altmans...They bury their father, Mort, pun no doubt intended, with the right mix of tears and unearthed resentments, and they take the blows life hands them seriously enough but in stride. As if they are nothing special," she writes. "This is exactly the charm of Jonathan Tropper's novel on which the comedy/drama is based. " Sharkey also appreciates the cast's camaraderie, writing, "The performances are dialed down by the high-profile cast; no one in the ensemble tries to outshine the others, no scene-stealing here. It's as if Levy set the button very close to mute."
• Rolling Stone's Peter Travers insists Tropper would "be right to sue if he hadn't written the dumb script himself...The movie embalms every cliché of Jewish-family dysfunction. Bateman and Fey rise above the material. The others, notably Fonda doing boob-job jokes at her own expense, aren't so lucky."
• Entertainment Weekly's Chris Nashawaty calls the movie a "bland-as-oatmeal comedy" that "is so festooned with clichés it proves that Tolstoy was dead wrong when he wrote that every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way." Noting comparisons to the movies August: Osage County, Home For the Holidays and The Family Stone, Nashawaty says he wishes the movie took more risks. "Why cast such talented, interesting, and edgy performers if you're only going to ask them play it safe?" he wonders.
• The Hollywood Reporter's Todd McCarthy describes the film as "a potty-mouthed comedy with enough exasperation, aggravations, long-standing grievances and get-me-outta-here moments of family stress to strike a chord with anyone who's ever had to endure large clan gatherings that might have lasted a bit too long." He argues that "Fonda dominates every scene she's in" and says Britton "excels in the film's one touching scene." In addition to praising Levy's "silky smooth" execution, McCarty writes, "The other performers well know where the laughs are and go for them expediently."
• Us Weekly's Mara Reinstein says the family's "crises are rarely resolved in a genuine or affecting way. Every cozy depiction of sibling bonding—especially between Bateman and Fey—leads to contrived hijinks. It's as if...Shawn Levy...couldn't complete an insightful or sharp thought without throwing in a sitcom-y exclamation point." Moreover, "The terrific cast can't always handle the jarring tonal shifts."
• Variety's Scott Foundas writes, "The cliché conflicts and character types arrive with such breakneck speed during the film's first half that you can't help wondering if anyone involved with This Is Where I Leave You had seen Jason Reitman's Young Adult, a movie that took this very sort of you-can't-go-home-again heart-tugger and turned it savagely on its ear. But around the halfway mark, the movie quits trying quite so hard to make you love it and takes on a more nuanced, lifelike countenance."