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Critics Consensus: What They Had finds laughter and tears in its portrait of a family at a crossroads, with writer-director Elizabeth Chomko getting outstanding performances out of a talented cast.
Critic Consensus: What They Had finds laughter and tears in its portrait of a family at a crossroads, with writer-director Elizabeth Chomko getting outstanding performances out of a talented cast.
All Critics (83) | Top Critics (23) | Fresh (73) | Rotten (10)
An affecting drama propped up by unexpected and humanizing moments of comedy.
There's an inherent longing in Elizabeth Chomko's stunning feature debut, What They Had.
Blythe Danner does a remarkable job of conveying Ruth's irreversible path into total memory loss without turning her into a movie-of-the-week cliché.
You may feel as if you've seen this movie before: Ruth has Alzheimer's, her husband Burt is in denial and their grown children Nick and Bridget are at odds. But please, trust me, you haven't...
What sets the film apart is the literate and insightful script by Elizabeth Chomko, who also directs, and a cast of stellar performers.
One of the year's best indie dramas, one that should hit home with a wide range of viewers sure to relate to the achingly authentic family dynamics on display.
It can happen to us all
draws its dramatic power from its honest depiction of the bitter realities of aging, which it shades from time to time with bits of dour humor
What They Had does not break new ground from a narrative standpoint, but its honesty makes the film immensely relatable
The conflicts in this family are real and heartfelt. Occasionally, though, the dialogue sounds stilted and overwritten.
It was a stroke of genius casting the rough-edged Shannon as Forster's son. These two are both seemingly incapable of false moments onscreen and have similarly hardened hides.
Under [Elizabeth] Chomko's direction, 'What They Had' not only has the chaos of dementia down pat but also proceeds at a pace that wastes no time developing the narrative.
The epitome of perfectly competent, appropriately moving, and decidedly routine What They Had attempts to break the monotony of the family drama, but despite a handful of strong performances from a rather stellar cast-Shannon and Forster stand-out, but it's Swank who holds this thing together-first-time filmmaker Elizabeth Chomko (who also has the sole writing credit) doesn't yet have the chops to execute the film in a way that makes this families tragedy rise above that of other, similarly-themed dramas.
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