When you read the official movie synopsis you will be thrown off course; it's not much of a comedy per say, so it's been labeled a dark comedy but it's more than that. As most labeled dark comedies don't fare all that well with the general public and indeed with some critics, the ratings tend to throw you off as well, but let's dig a little deeper and try to see what writer/director Jacob Aaron Estes has concocted here. The main protagonist in the movie, Jeff Lang, played by Tobey Maguire, is a OBGYN ten years into a marriage that is
well, on the fritz and his life turns to hell temporarily before the movie ends very surprisingly on a high note.
The movie opens with Jeff and Nealy Lang, played oh so well by the beautiful Elizabeth Banks, celebrating their ten year wedding anniversary with a toast from Peter and Rebecca Mazzoni, played respectively by Ray Liotta and Kerry Washington. But all is not well in the marriage as that evening Jeff can't even get lucky; we'll only discover later that this anomaly is simply due to the fact that his lovely wife has been having an affair (but we don't get to know with whom) for the past six months. Furthermore, Nealy is upset with Jeff as he chose the cheaper sodding over seeding of their backyard. Now the big deal with the racoons and that sodded lawn is really where the idea of "DETAILS", on which Estes based his title and perhaps found the key to juxtapose the story's main storyline, finds the mark.
There's a commonly known problem with racoons and sodded lawns; they will dig your lawn to no end and turn the sod over for grub. This leads to Jeff trying to poison the critters and in the process he kills the neighbor's cat. The neighbor Lila, played superbly by Laura Linney, is, to put it mildly, a cookoo person. Blaming Jeff for the death of her precious cat she manipulates him into a wild (that bit is really funny) session of impromptu sex. It was not Jeff's first transgression that week as he did have himself a good romp with earlier mentioned Rebecca Mazzoni, his long time friend from college; she was merely commiserating with him and I cannot think of a better person to feel for one's pain than Kerry Washington.
Jeff's basketball playing friend Lincoln, played wonderfully by Dennis Haysbert, has been dealt a bad hand by faith; they bonded over the years and Jeff's friend is blessed suddenly by his buddy doctor's beyond kind gestures, one of which has him donating a kidney to him. That gesture ingratiates Jeff to Nealy, but as Jeff confides in Lincoln his newest tribulation with crazy neighbor Lila, who he got pregnant, the grateful Lincoln misinterprets Jeff's rambling, and kills Lila to repay Jeff for what he did for him. The moment Jeff decides to share with his wife his transgressions and the awful turn of events is where the audience gets that this is not a comedy. The choices about what to do under the circumstances are not great, but going over the details of those choices, they find a way through it.
Estes lacked good material in the sub-plot dealing with Ray Liotta's revenge against Jeff for cheating with his wife, but other than that, I found the movie a nice piece of work. The cast had led me to believe I could expect nothing less than good performances and I was not disappointed. Tobey Maguire's character reminded me in some way of his role as Homer in The Cider House Rules, perhaps due to the OBGYN bit, while Laura Linney's play had somewhat of the same effect for me as that with a passage of her role as Eleanor in Man of the Year. In short, I liked it and I trust those who like this movie genre will get to see it before it is forgotten.
