La joya de la familia

They can act full of hate,discrimination & judgement during a holiday that's fine. Julie is welcomed without questions,for what she says or does. Frankly I don't blame Meredith for the,awkwardness of her behavior. Than how things end up,just make it more bizarre. The few times it had good moments,was overshadowed with something negative. Cast & cinematography,was something decently done. Ben was respectful to Meredith,but still didn't save the movie. Glad Meredith felt some peace towards the end,but frankly the family didn't deserve her. Or maybe her & the sister,was needed for the family to turnaround. Watch it but if you ever felt unwelcomed,in a family despite trying your best.. Skip it!

I must disagree with many of the film's critics who found this to be a pleasant and amusing view of a complicated family holiday reunion. Perhaps because of my background as a mental health professional, I found this to be a very confusing and inconsistent attempt to picture what could have been a funny family event. The writers touched so many bases that one wonders if five families could have contained the many quirks, pathologies and eccentricities found in this single unit. My overall impression was of the incredible nastiness this family displayed toward the fiancée of the eldest son, a person no one but the youngest daughter had ever met, but who became the target of hostility, primarily based on the report given by the nasty little sister. The fact that the parents were incapable of maintaining even a modicum of civility or to set the example for the children, speaks to their dysfunction rather than the humor of the situation. Yes, I realize that a terminal illness was also an issue, and yes, Keaton is a fine actress, but her character failed the test of grace--more the writer's fault than Keaton's.

I think that what would actually have happened in this situation is that either the eldest son would have upbraided his family for their boorish and cruel behavior, taken his fiancée and left(if he was really committed)telling them they could call him when they grew up; or, the fiancée, seeing that he was not really committed, would have left, herself. However, had either of these things happened, the movie would have been about 20 minutes long, too short for Roger Ebert to have waxed eloquent.

I admit, I only rented this DVD because I like the Wilson brothers and one of them (Luke) is in it. I don't even remember this film being in the theaters. But I loved it! It was one of the most entertaining movies I've seen in quite awhile. Cinematically, it was nothing impressive, but the writing and the acting was quite good and the end actually made me cry (that's pretty hard to do). It is a rare movie where I can honestly say, everyone in the cast did a great job. And the screenwriters did a great job too. One problem with a lot of Hollywood films, for me at least, is the unbelievability of the characters or the one-sidedness of characters. All of the characters in this film were believable and had good and bad aspects to them. I guess if you are looking for a more fantasy-based storyline, this wouldn't be the film for you. The interactions are all very realistic and it plays out like a realistic holiday that could occur in just about any family. You won't come away from the film learning any great, deep lessons, but you will come away feeling entertained, and wishing that you could keep in touch with the characters to see where their lives take them.

Thomas Bezucha's 'The Family Stone' surprised me. I expected a catty WASPish family satire – that, at least, was the impression given in most reviews. I liked this a great deal. The discomfort felt by Sarah Jessica Parker's uptight career girl as she spends Christmas with her partner's close-knit New England liberal family is used to good effect, but as much awkwardness is felt as a result of their jibes as by her tactlessness, so she's not marked out solely as a stooge. Dermot Mulroney, Rachel McAdams (the best thing in Wes Craven's 'Red Eye'), Luke Wilson (a much better actor than brother Owen) and Diane Keaton also give fine turns, and Craig T. Nelson - another much underrated character actor – is perfectly cast Keaton's husband. It's occasionally sentimental, as certain family secrets are revealed, but never in a sickly manner, and works principally because it's that rare Hollywood beast, a genuinely well written ensemble piece. Good work Mr Bezucha. Worth a look.

Honoring Diane Keaton. And now I've got a few more Diane Keaton movies added to my Watchlist. I've seen quite a lot of her but there are still a few that I could try out.

First impression - love that Diane Keaton just looks and dresses like herself while playing a character in this movie. I think she did that in a lot of these lighter movies and she was probably given free rein with her character, as she should. She is gorgeous. Second - how many children did this woman give birth to?

Everybody's mean to Meredith and that's probably like three quarters of the movie, and while Sarah Jessica Parker does her best to make her tough to like, she doesn't deserve it. At some point it really became too much, they could just ignore her. This is not really a comedy, I don't even understand how they marketed this, it's just downright mean and then it went sideways in a big way. I did not understand the low rating watching it but when Everett started going for Julie and Ben was practically hitting on Meredith every chance he got it just lost me completely. Meredith and Ben are a case of opposites attract that wouldn't make it for long in the real world, not with her career and Everett and Julie is just so damn creepy in that entire context, it's just bad timing and in bad taste and I really hope people don't do this in real life cause I will disinherit family over that. So yeah, that's how I rated this movie, despite the fact that it's got an amazing cast and they all played their insufferable roles to perfection.