Drew Turney
Amber Heard is compulsively watchable, but this is her first lead role in a long time, and despite the pink dyed hair and girlchild/punk attitude of an adrift millennial, her character and delivery are all just a bit bland.
Far more interesting (not to be confused with likeable) is Christopher Walken as her dad Paul, a former singing star who enjoyed a Tony Bennett-like career as a best selling crooner. He’s been through about three wives (and is currently in the midst of divesting himself of the fourth, against his better judgement) when we find him in the midst of another comeback plan is daughter fears will make him a laughing stock.
As Jude, Heard gets kicked out of her Manhattan apartment and so, with nowhere else to go, drives to the exclusive enclave of The Hamptons to stay with a father she can’t relate to and doesn’t get along with.
Over the course of the next few weeks her frosty sister and brother in law hang around – uncovering a romantic can of worms – with the ever brilliant Oliver Platt on hand as Paul’s lawyer, trying to keep the peace in the family and keep Paul’s next big chance on track at the same time.
It’s certainly not the first family-in-distress dramedy you’ve seen and it won’t be the last. There are some funny lines and some interesting performances, though a particularly nasty scene of Jude’s sister responding to the soon-to-be-ex-wife’s lawsuit should have been ditched (along with most of the subplot) – why the audience should be happy at his family rallying around to further enable someone so self absorbed who deserves to be eviscerated in court is a big misstep on the part of the script.
But for yet another Anna Karenina-inspired tale where familial discord is writ epic (the line about unhappy families being so in their own way, etc) – and set once again against the backdrop of successful artists – it just needed something extra to really stand on its own.
