3 Stars — Wholesome
Real life is seldom planned. That’s not to say we couldn’t or shouldn’t make plans toward our preferred future, but that we should be ready to change those plans when real life breaks in. That’s the lesson Dan Burns (Steve Carell) learns in this film. Having found true love and marriage and family, Dan speaks from his experience in his newspaper column titled Dan in Real Life. But when his wife becomes ill and dies, and his daughters grow into young women with minds of their own, and he serendipitously meets a woman for whom his heart opens, he soon discovers that real life can seldom be defined in a column Written and directed by Peter Hedges (Pieces of April), as well as writing credits by Pierce Gardner, Dan in Real Life is a comedy of familial proportions. Capturing both the support and expectations of life in a large family, the film is an honest expression of the joys, sorrows, disappointments and forgiveness of real families.
Having lost his wife four years earlier, we begin with Dan trying to navigate his three daughters’ coming of age without their mother’s help. His resistance to this transition is seen as he stubbornly will not teach his 17-year-old daughter, Jane (Alison Pill), to drive, or allow his 15-year-old daughter, Cara (Brittany Robertson), to date, or listen to the wisdom that his fourth-grade daughter, Lilly (Marlene Lawston), proclaims. It is clear his insensitivity to their disappointment and anger comes from his closed and grieving heart caused by the loss of his wife and their mother.
But real life doesn’t just break in with disease and death, it also breaks in with unexpected love. Taking his daughters out of school to go to Rhode Island for their annual family gathering to close the beach home of his parents for the summer, events occur there that change everything. It begins in a chance meeting in a bookstore and travels through the troubled waters of love, betrayal, secrecy and passion, and ends with Dan experiencing the opening of his heart to love, his daughters and a whole new, real life.
We won’t spoil the tale by telling more than this, but the values of the film are worth noting. Presenting a real family living real lives, the importance of family, honesty, integrity, love and forgiveness are all reinforced within the film. The chaotic nature of family gatherings with moments of deep affection and commitment are present as each person is accepted despite obvious imperfections. The family rituals that reinforce identity and build trust within the family are shown in varying forms throughout the film, and parents’ nonanxious guidance is helpful throughout the decades of their children’s lives.
Dan in Real Life is an endearing comedy of the experiences of life in all its complex and unplanned realities. View it with someone you love.
Discussion:
1. When Dan denies that what Cara feels for Marty Barasco (Felipe Dieppa) is real love, he misses the opportunity to rejoice with her in this ability to love as well as guide her in its dangers. How do you think a parent should respond to their teenager’s first love? How did your parents respond to you?
2. What would you have done if you were Dan and realized the situation with your brother? What would you have done if you were Marie?
3. At the end of the film, when Dan’s brother, Mitch (Dane Cook), immediately goes out with Ruthie Draper (Emily Blunt), do you believe he is over Marie (Juliette Binoche)? Why do you answer as you do?
4. The film implies a happily ever-after ending. Do you believe this to be true? Why or why not?
Cinema In Focus is a social and spiritual movie commentary. Hal Conklin is a former mayor of Santa Barbara and Denny Wayman is pastor of Free Methodist Church on the Mesa. For more reviews, visit www.cinemainfocus.com.