Something for Not Everybody

"While We're Young" is a hard movie to categorize.  If you saw the trailer like I did, you were probably expecting a wall-to-wall, laugh-out-loud comedy, especially given the presence of Ben Stiller.   So, when folks comes out of the theater and are a little confused, you feel like the film cheated or tricked you.

Me?   I read the reviews and was advised of the dark shift in tone for the second half of the movie.  Knowing that beforehand, "While We're Young" worked for me.  But I can understand how others felt misled.  

Indeed, the premise of the film does, by itself, provoke laughter.   Forty-somethings Ben Stiller and Naomi Watts are a childless, yet content married couple in Manhattan.   He's a documentary filmmaker who's been working ten years on one project.  He aspires to be just like his father-in-law, who's an award-winning documentarian and played here by the always reliable Charles Grodin.   Both husband and wife are happy but seemingly bored at the same time.  

Enter a chance meeting with a couple of 25-year-old hipsters played by Adam Driver and Amanda Seyfried. They are aimless, clueless, and surprisingly successful at what they do.  Stiller and Watts are taken in by these two youthful evangelists and before you know it, they are knee deep in clothes that is too young for them and hip hop dance routines that test their arthritic knees.

Admittedly, this all sets up as a rollicking comedy.  Yet, director and writer Noah Baumbach probably knew that would be nothing but a SNL sketch.  As a result, he expands the plot line to take things into a more introspective and ultimately dark direction.  Placed side-by-side against these two young idiots and later con artists, Stiller and Watts examine their choices in life.  And that winds up with a film that is much more-layered and richer in emotion.

Amazingly, Ben Stiller is up to the dramatic task here.  You can really feel his pain and his anguish as Driver sails through life with one success after another.  If you're older than forty, you can really identify with Stiller's emotions   It's just not the laugh fest you were expecting.

But does it have to be?   Indeed, you might argue that the trailer for "While We're Young" is inaccurate and misleading.  I guess audiences might be annoyed when they don't get the comedy they were expecting.

As for me, I appreciated the twist in tone.  Because that's what life itself is all about.

LEN'S RATING:  Three stars.

Dinner last night:  Turkey sausage, sauerkraut, and pickled beets.