http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0780511/
Robert de niro doesn't owe us anything. People complain that he picks bad roles these days, but so did many great actors. Look at Michael caine in the 80s, he was in Jaws 4: The revenge! De niro has always been a good actor, and in this film he shows a kinder side. This film has had one of the worst trailers I have seen in ages. The trailer makes it look like a slightly goofy feel good family film. It is the exact opposite, in fact it is a pretty depressing and sad tale of a father trying to reconnect with his family after his wife dies. To do this he surpries them by visiting via train, and bus. On his journey we find out he is very sick. He takes pills to help, and his doctor advises him not to travel. De niro's character is one of his more sympathetic, usually I find him quite cold even when doing emotional scenes. Here though he plays a very sympathetic character. We feel his pain and repressed frustration as the family he is visiting thinks of ways to lie to him throughout the film about his other son David and why he can't stay. Sam Rockwell is good as usual as a struggling composer son wasting his talents as a drummer, and Drew Barrymore is one of his daughters. She was pretty forgetable though, but Kate Beckinsale is quite good. One of the problems with this film is how it uses kids. De niro see's his grown up family as children sometimes when they walk toward him or talk. This is sweet at first and it shows how he remembers them as young kids, but then they turn back into lieing adults. After a while though it starts to get a bit cheesy, especially when he has a dream conversation with them about why they lied to him and why they can't feel like they can connect to him even though they connected to their mom. He was only lied to and told all the good news while being spared the bad.
He is trying to get back into their lives and have a family dinner like they used to when their mom was alive. But this time he wants to be let into their lives.Back to the dream scene though. It drags out way too long and it has all these little kids discussing grow up problems and having and argeument with de niro's character. At first it was cute, but then it just seemed like lazy storytelling. It summed up every single plot detail left hanging and explained all the characters of the film too easily. Aside from de niro's character you never really get a sense of the family. They are given personalities but they hide things from their dad and dont seem to find lieing to him a big deal. Which of course is the point, when it comes to your family you have to hear everything whether it is good or bad. This is one of those nice films that is really nothing special when it comes down to it. It will not be remembered as one of de nirp's best, but for what it is worth I quite enjoyed it. If you want to watch a lovely film about a man reconnecting with his children and you don't mind a slightly sad story then this is worth watching. it wont win any awards, but it is still worth seeing despite how predictable and generic it can be. I found it quite heartwarming and heck thanks to de niro's acting it even had some emotionally powerful scenes. Sometimes you don't want to watch a gritty drama, and if you just want to relax and watch a nice film you don't have to ponder over then I recommend this. It has something for everybody, drama, comedy, tragedy, and Robert De niro. What more could you want from a film like this?
Overall I give it a 7 out of 10.