Silver Linings Playbook

Seen in the theater for the first time in November 2012.

At its core, "Silver Linings Playbook" is kind of a shitty romantic comedy. It nonetheless has some very funny jokes. You can kind of picture Adam Sandler playing the lead role, and the film this is most reminiscent of is "Punch Drunk Love," though not as good. It's entertaining as you watch it and the manipulation is effective even if you get tired of Jennifer Lawrence giving lectures on her emotions. Her performance is still good and I love her though. But still your brain knows that deep down this is not a good movie. The phrase to describe it is pandering sentimentality of the worst kind.

It reminds me of the distaste I get when I think of a film like "Little Miss Sunshine" or "Black Snake Moan." What these films have in common in my opinion is the impression that they started as a very good idea, and then got focus grouped into a kind of mawkish nausea. One senses their was once vision here, and that was diluted into some kind of  lowest common denominator blandness. Still, it's easy enough to simply enjoy a movie like this for its charms which are inoffensive enough, but it never quite vanquishes the nagging empty feeling that despite the kooky crazy antics of the two mains and a tired Robert De Niro, this is a mass produced cliche of bland diversion in the romantic-comedy form. We hunger for it to subvert that form, but it never does. Grade C +.