In attendance: Noah Baumbach


With THE SQUID AND THE WHALE, writer/director Noah Baumbach drew comparisons with Woody Allen by depicting neurotically self-aware, New York literary types. In his new film, Baumbach audaciously approaches the mode of Allen's hero, Ingmar Bergman.

Nicole Kidman and Jennifer Jason Leigh are both superlative as Margot and Pauline, sisters who are alternately volatile and cerebral, and also sexually provocative. When Pauline gets married (to a bohemian type played by an unexpectedly subtle Jack Black), Margaret compulsively criticizes everyone and everything around her. Pauline barely keeps it together, struggling to contain her resentments despite the New Age theories she spouts.

Their meticulously rendered sibling dynamic—with its half-spoken accusations, memories both nostalgic and bitter and all-consuming need—is alternately hilarious and painful, with Harris Savides's fluid camerawork capturing all the complicated cross-currents at work. The superb ensemble also includes Ciarán Hinds and John Turturro.

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