As someone who really likes double meanings of titles (as in my book and script and website Minding Therapy) I highly recommend the new film A Real Pain, written and directed by one of its main stars, Jesse Eisenberg.
In a nutshell, David (Eisenberg) and his cousin Benji (Kieran Culkin), who grew up like brothers but have now been less connected, embark on a Jewish heritage tour in Poland. “They plan to end their trip by visiting the hometown of their recently deceased grandmother who escaped one of the camps. But first, under the eyes of a well-meaning gentile British guide — an excellent Will Sharpe — they join a small group that includes a melancholy divorcee played by Jennifer Grey, and a Tutsi survivor of the Rwandan genocide — that’s Kurt Egyiawan — who has converted to Judaism” (John Powers, NPR.)
Although David is the successful one, i.e., in his life and work, his nature is serious, intellectual, and anxious. He manages his OCD with medication. Benji, who is the unemployed, depressed, grieving, pot-smoking, emotionally volatile one, who can be “a real pain,” nevertheless has attractive qualities of charisma, playfulness, and sensitivity.
Nick Schager, Daily Beast: “Together, [Culkin and Eisenberg] make for a winning pair, balancing each other in a variety of ways that speak to the material’s larger concerns about loss, grief, remembrance and regret.” Pain.
Watch the trailer below:
Although both roles are acted well, Culkin deservedly gets distinctive praise from many of the film critics. A sampling:
David Fear, Rolling Stone: “Eisenberg has generously gifted his costar with the sort of raging-id role that most actors could only dream of, and Culkin rewards his director/castmate with the single greatest, funniest, most cringe-comic and heartbreaking performance of his career.”
Richard Roeper, Chicago Sun Times: “…Culkin gives a career-best performance in taking a character who could have been a one-dimensional, shtick-reliant jerk and infusing him with a vulnerability and empathy.”
Mick LaSalle, San Francisco Chronicle: “Culkin gives you something closer to life, a character of complication, contradiction and unknowability. He gives us a whole person, so vivid and true that we feel that we know someone just like him, even if we don’t.”
Selected Overall Reviews of A Real Pain
John Powers, NPR: “Eisenberg uses this cockeyed version of a road movie to tell a funny, moving, casually profound story about family, friendship, the weight of the Jewish past, the weight of everyone’s past and the different ways one deals with suffering.”
Tomris Laffly, Harper’s Bazaar: “Understated, funny, and gradually heart-swelling…Eisenberg’s Chopin-kissed sophomore feature is as graceful as movies come. Expect to hear about this one in the next awards season.”
Stephanie Zacharek, Time: “Some people feel too much, while others don’t feel enough. How can we balance out that inequity? How do we treat those who bear the heaviest load with kindness? A Real Pain suggests that it’s not as easy at looks. But it’s the least, and the most, we can do.”
