Greenberg

It takes a little while to get fully on board with Noah Baumbach's latest caustic comedy, but if you can, the payoff is pretty great. Ben Stiller is ideal casting as Roger Greenberg, a misanthropic, failed New York musician now working as a carpenter who returns to LA to house-sit for his wealthy brother and build him a dog house. Roger doesn't drive, so he's stuck in the luxurious home until he encounters Florence Marr (Greta Gerwig), his brother's assistant. Younger than him, but lost in a different kind of way, these two form an odd, sometimes prickly bond. Roger's further encounters with his old buddy Ivan (Rhys Ifans), his former bandmate Eric (Mark Duplass), his ex-girlfriend Beth (Jennifer Jason Leigh), his college-aged niece (Brie Larson), and her friend Muriel (Juno Temple)—the cast is packed with talent—leave him feeling all the more angry, isolated, and fearful.

Greenberg's neuroses are hard to take, and his New York bluntness baffles and alienates the LA folks. But Stiller, Baumbach, and Gerwig manage to make him somewhat sympathetic. Gerwig is the key. By making Florence such a central figure (she's not the protagonist, but she's the first character we see, and the only one with a life outside Greenberg's presence), we're able to experience Roger somewhat through her eyes. The film is co-written by Baumbach's partner, Jennifer Jason Leigh, who provides Florence's perspective without turning her into someone secure and together enough to be with Greenberg. We watch these two characters awkwardly move towards connection, and we even (sometimes) root for them to get together. But this is not a typical indie romance about two lovably quirky characters. Greenberg is a laugh-out-loud comedy about people in pain.