THE SAVAGES (2007)

Despite its grim subject matter (death, dementia, family dysfunction), THE SAVAGES is engaging, enjoyable and often funny. Two unhappy siblings – Wendy (Laura Linney) and Jon Savage (Philip Seymour Hoffman) – are forced to engage with their dying father (Philip Bosco) as he slips into dementia. Linney and Hoffman vividly portray the kind of cluttered, precarious relationship that siblings can have, thick with past grievances, but also unspoken affections and connections that can't even be articulated. Writer-director Tamara Jenkins finds honest emotion and sly, sideways humor in the starkness of mortality, She doesn't force any easy epiphanies on her story, but rathr, lets the characters find solace through their own clumsy efforts. Anyone who appreciates the messiness of humanity – the territory that Hollywood movies seem to have surrendered to smart indie films – will find THE SAVAGES a smart, genuine, and empathic portrait of life.