ShareThisIn some ways, "Smart People" takes the easy way out.It pokes fun at the ivory tower and bows to the cinematic trope that heart is more important than brains. It doesn't pretend that it plans to do otherwise.But for all its narrative and emotional predictability, "Smart People" charts its own course as a dysfunctional-family saga that recognizes the complexity of human beings and uses humor to shine light on their strengths and flaws.Lawrence Wetherhold (Dennis Quaid) is an English professor whose specialty is Victorian literature. His colleagues at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh aren't fond of him; his students are even less so.A widower for several years, Lawrence has no inclination to connect with people. He's condescending and rude, and his only admirer is his teen daughter, Vanessa (Ellen Page), who has sadly taken to mimicking her father's academic drive and disregard for socializing. Son James (Ashton Holmes), a Carnegie Mellon student who lives on campus, tries to keep his distance from his father.Lawrence's stubbornness lands him in the emergency room with a head injury. Though he doesn't remember her, he discovers that the ER chief, Dr. Janet Hartigan (Sarah Jessica Parker), is a former student who had a college crush on him.Banned from driving for six months, Lawrence is forced to accept the offer of his brother, Chuck (Thomas Haden Church), to be his chauffeur. This works out well for Chuck, who is out of work and hoped to coax Lawrence into putting him up for a while. Lawrence, who's had to support irresponsible Chuck before, refers to Chuck as his "adopted brother" and fears, rightly, that Chuck will not carry out his duty faithfully.Lawrence asks Janet out on a date, which ends badly. Eventually, though, he tries again, and a hesitant romance ensues. Meanwhile, Chuck makes it his goal to turn Vanessa into a real teen-ager instead of a mini-Lawrence, a move that she misinterprets.Likable Quaid is surprisingly convincing as misanthropic Lawrence, making his brittleness more than skin deep. Parker delivers on an archetype of a modern woman, drawn to doomed relationships due to a fear of commitment.Page ably plays the flip side of her "Juno" character, a driven Young Republican who's been cheated out of positive parental role models, while Holmes serves mostly as a plot convenience. Church steals all his scenes as a near-bum who's happy with life.Commercials director Noam Murro, in his feature debut, steers clear of slick imagery and gives the characters and mood time to gel. The script by Mark Jude Poirier gets bleaker than expected, but the cynicism feels honest and the sharp humor is delicious.Everyone in the film gets an education. The most endearing thing about "Smart People" is its characters' learning curve.Rated R for language, brief teen drug and alcohol use, and for sexuality.Four stars (out of five)(Contact Knoxville News Sentinel film critic Betsy Pickle at pickle(at)knews.com.)(Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, http://www.scrippsnews.com)
A good saga about a dysfunctional family
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