The Meyerowitz Stories (New and Selected) (2017)

When I first saw The Meyerowitz Stories on Netflix, I decided I would pass it because of Adam Sandler. He's always so annoying and his movies are always so stupid, I didn't want to waste time watching it. Then Kevin over Speaks in Movie Lines spoke highly of it (and Sandler's performance) so I absolutely had to check it out. And I'm glad I did because it was a real joy to watch.

It tells the stories of three estranged siblings, Danny (Adam Sandler), Jean (Elizabeth Marvel) and Matt (Ben Stiller), that reunite when their bitter ageing father (Dustin Hoffmann) gets hospitalized and try to figure out how to step out from their father's shadow and live their own lives.

The film portrays and analyses with wit and realism this dysfunctional family, mainly focusing on the rivalry between Danny and Matt, unemployed and divorced the first, successful business-wise but trapped in an unhappy marriage the latter.

Which brings me to the only problem I had with this, it completely left out Jean's story. Watching the multiple storylines unravelling and witnessing the slow amending of the relationship between the characters and their growth (especially Matt's) was interesting and enjoyable but the movie ends and we barely know a thing about Jean. And it's a shame because her character could have been so interesting.

Netflix

But now let's talk about the real deal here, Adam Sandler. Yes, you read that right. Adam Sandler gives his best performance ever as Danny, the older brother dealing with a divorce and with the loss of his daughter Eliza, brilliantly played by Grace Van Patten, who is leaving for college. I know it's not that hard to top his past performances, but this one could (and hopefully will) lead to an Oscar nomination. Also, the chemistry he has with Grace Van Patten is great and they share a father-and-daughter moment that is the most emotional, touching and beautiful moment of the film.

Ben Stiller is also very good as Matt, the successful brother and favourite son. His character is the one that changes the most throughout the film, and he's able to deliver that. And he's really great at portraying that struggle between staying calm and polite and just losing it at the beginning of his story when he's having lunch with his father (I could really relate to that). Dustin Hoffman also gives a great performance as Harold, the family patriarch who can face his failure as a father and can accept the fact of being a nothing more than a mediocre artist. Great support also comes from Elizabeth Marvel who unfortunately doesn't have a lot of screen time but never misses the change to shine, and Emma Thompson who plays Harold's new wife, a quite unlikable and almost-unexistent character.

More New June Titles (2013)

A few more noteworthy titles that showed up on Instant this month:

Chasing Ice (2012)

A sobering, provocative documentary that follows nature photographer James Balog's on-camera quest to document how unnervingly fast the world's glaciers are melting and what this implies for the planet's future. Not simply an environmentalist polemic trumpeting the latest global-warming theories to mollify the already converted, Chasing Ice is an adventure story and travelogue about one man challenged by the elements, his own hardheaded determination, and the breakdown of his increasingly fragile body while seeking empirical evidence for what many of us already suspected but which until now had never been witnessed. The time-lapse images of enormous glaciers receding and shrinking into muddy splotches are horrifying and heartbreaking, but also beautiful and miraculous, especially once you've seen the struggle it took to achieve them. Balog's art and sacrifice may have worn him down physically�like one of his own compromised ice floes�but with any luck enough people will see his amazing work and be inspired to act. Or at the very least question their views. The evidence is here. All you have to do is look.

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