Hoffman and Linney bring a credible blend of ease and exasperation to the sibling relations, which show concern and competition in roughly equal measure. [DVD]
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04/21/08
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The Savages (2007)
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Reviews Counted:162
Fresh:144
Rotten:18
Average Rating:7.5/10
Consensus: Thanks to a tender, funny script from director Tamara Jenkins, and fine performances from Philip Seymour Hoffman and Laura Linney, this film delivers a nuanced, beautifully three-dimensional look at the struggles and comforts of family bonds.
Theatrical Release:Nov 30, 2007 Limited
Box Office: $6,426,953
Synopsis: Director Tamara Jenkins made audiences sit for nearly a decade for her follow-up to the hilarious dark comedy SLUMS OF BEVERLY HILLS, but it's been worth the wait. Like her previous film, THE... [More]
Starring: Laura Linney, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Philip Bosco, Peter Friedman
Director: Tamara Jenkins
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Reviews for The Savages
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04/03/08
There really doesn't seem to be much of a bright side about a brother and sister who are faced with putting their father in a nursing home, but Jenkins manages to mine humor and heart out of the bleak circumstances.
03/17/08
The Savages is the sort of film that, while ringing with laudable authenticity and an admirable lack of maudlin sentimentality, prefers wallowing in misery to reaching for transformation.
02/28/08
Call me hokey if you want. I just would have liked more heart in there somewhere. But the acting is superb and it's worth seeing just for that. By no means watch this over the holidays but pursue its scholarly merit on safe ground.
02/16/08
Most of all about recovering, about picking yourself up, dusting yourself off, and plugging on. It also just happens to be, in its small, astutely observed, delicately bittersweet way, one of the best films of the year.
02/08/08
It's billed as a comedy. You may or may not find much to laugh at.
02/07/08
Jenkins' superlative work proves her first film was no fluke; let's hope it doesn't take another nine years to hear from her again.
02/01/08
There are resonant moments of elderly vulnerability and strong acting from Hoffman and Bosco, but Linney's overly familiar exasperated-woman performance and Jenkins' been-there, done-that-better story sink "The Savages.
02/01/08
Screenwriter/director Tamara Jenkins (Slums of Beverly Hills) is smart enough not to try to redeem any of these people — at least not in the traditional, cinematic sense.
01/31/08
Jenkins' brushstrokes of her characters are too exacting to move us more than a lifelike painting of a basket of fruit. We can be awed at the techniques, but walk away empty.
01/29/08
Two fine performances, a subject close to all our hearts and a screenplay that manages to be both brilliantly witty and almost unbearably poignant add up to the best family comedy-drama since Little Miss Sunshine.
01/24/08
The pleasures are small but intense and the spell cast in one of the most surprisingly moving films of the year is captivating.
01/24/08
In Tamara Jenkins' brutally frank and occasionally funny look at lives shaped by disappointment and fear, their love for each other binds them through the worst of times.
01/24/08
Jenkins’s solemn comedy may be 389 jokes short of a Woody Allen classic, but there is a tenderness about these flawed heroes that is profoundly touching.
01/24/08
A powerful, incisive, often very funny look at aging, ailing family dynamics, superbly acted by two of the best in the business.
01/24/08
A richly nuanced American comedy, with two acting talents working at their absolute peak.
01/24/08
The latter half suffers from degenerative indie-itis, that epidemic syndrome whose main symptom is unwarranted interest in the ennui afflicting well-read urban misfits.
01/23/08
Hoffman and Linney make a great comedy team, even though the movie they're in is a sometimes grim affair...
01/21/08
Two wry, sad, occasionally funny but always unflinching hours.
01/18/08
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