Beginners

2010 romantic comedy

Rating: 14/20

Plot: Following a shocking announcement and the death of his father, a guy taking care of a needy dog meets a new love interest.

This might demand a little more intellectual attention than I was willing to put into it. My mind thought I was watching a romantic comedy, so I think it might have shut down a little too much. There are some pieces to this that don't seem to fit narratively or thematically, and it's possible that that's entirely my fault.

Time comes up again and again, for example. What's all this time business?

I also felt like I needed more time with some of the characters' relationships. None of them--and that probably includes the Jack Russell terrier's relationships--have enough time to develop in satisfying ways. I thought the romance at the heart of this, likely because we're seeing this from Obi-Wan's perspective and know exactly where his mind's at, made sense from his side of things, but now I'm not convinced it wasn't as superficial as me also being smitten by a quirky-cute Melanie Laurent. She's apparently attracted to moping. Plummer, I suppose, is just horny. Goran Visnijic, as his boyfriend, had a haircut that I didn't trust, and I kept waiting for something nefarious to be revealed about him. When it wasn't, it was hard to pin down exactly what that character was about. And then there's the mother, another character I just couldn't pin down.

Maybe pinning down the characters isn't what this is about. And maybe it's not what any movie is supposed to be about. I enjoyed seeing the characters interact, the leads are very likable and one of them might even be lovable, the offbeat score adds a nice flavor, and that dog is stinkin' cute. Sometimes, the quirky asides and narrated bits are a little distracting.

I wonder if this could have worked better as a television mini-series.