Directed by: Jesse Eisenberg
Starring: Jesse Eisenberg, Kieran Culkin, Jennifer Grey
David Kaplan (Eisenberg) and his cousin Benji (Culkin) recently lost their grandmother and to honor her, they book a sightseeing tour of Poland which includes a tour of a concentration camp. This doesn't sound like the setup for a thoughtful, emotional film, but A Real Pain is both of those. When they meet up at the airport following many months of not seeing each other, we sense the differences in their personalities right away.
David is the more straight-laced family man with priorities. Benji isn't exactly a free spirit, but arrives hours early to the airport and bounces around from place to place because he has nothing stopping him, including a job or responsibilities. They fly to Warsaw, where Benji has a stash of weed he mailed to himself awaiting him at the hotel front desk. They meet with the tour group and then proceed to visit the Warsaw ghetto where thousands of Jews were eradicated during World War II. Benji attempts to be the guy pushing for David to let loose and have more fun, but this is a facade of a man at odds with himself and suffering.
The film's title, A Real Pain, has a dual meaning. It represents the overall pain caused by the Holocaust and Benji's private pain in which his beloved grandmother's death is merely the tip of the iceberg. A Real Pain is basically a two-actor movie, with Eisenberg and Culkin playing very well off of each other. Culkin's performance is deeper and more complex, because he is shouldering the most personal burden and is trying his mightiest to appear loose and carefree.
Even at ninety minutes, A Real Pain has moments that drag in the middle, but the positive far outweighs the negative with Eisenberg, who wrote and directed A Real Pain with sensitivity, taking us on an offbeat tour of not just places, but souls.
No comments:
Post a Comment