Review of Greenberg (2010) by Lorenzo V — 21 Aug 2010

"He's got a lot on his mind.".

A New Yorker moves to Los Angeles in order to figure out his life while he housesits for his brother, and he soon sparks with his brother's assistant.

REVIEW.

Stiller is wonderful as a miscreant, miserable slacker recently recovering from a nervous breakdown who visits his well-to-do brother in LA for house-sitting duties and meets a true challenge: true love in the unlikely form of his bro's personal assistant (Gerwig in a truly Oscar-worthy turn), who is also having difficulties of her own (namely avoiding being a human door mat), which culminates in a bittersweet involvement that will have you cringing and cheering at the same time. Filmmaker Noah Baumbach ? who collaborated on the bitingly clever screenplay with real-life wife Leigh (who co-stars as Stiller's former flame) ? captures the pitch-perfect mid-life crisis for the mid-40's set and elicits a truly raw/tender turn by Stiller (never better) with his misanthropic tendencies. Ultimately the film scores in its characterizations of arrested developments and yearning for self-personal achievement (i.e. getting through life!) One of the year's best films.