7/10
Of all the films I saw at Berlin in February, this was by far the most enjoyable. True, the competition was not great, but I highly recommend this wise and witty film about family which shows how much can be achieved with an intelligent well written script.
Set in contemporary California, the film is based around a nuclear family; two children, with two mothers. Julianne Moore and Annette Bening are a lesbian couple, with an 18 year old daughter (Mia Wasiwoska from Alice in Wonderland) and a 16 year old son. The kids are used to the situation, two mothers is normal for them, but the son has decided he'd like to know who was their sperm donor/father, and since his sister is now old enough to be told, he pressures her to find out. Not from their parents, but from the place where the sperm was donated.
And guess what, he's a cool and charming guy (Mark Ruffalo) who has an organic nursery and restaurant, and is thrilled by the idea of two teenagers who are interested in him. However, as is the way of these things, his arrival in the family life causes a fair amount of disruption, the details of which I'll let you find out for yourselves. The charm of the film is that it is funny, moving and credible. The characters are people we can believe in and care about, and their situation, if not identical to what we know, is familiar enough to be recognisable. The cast are uniformly terrific, and it should not be overlooked that the director is a woman, who brings to the project a sensibility that a man would not have. It's a film by women about women which will appeal to women, but hopefully to men as well.
