Last year's "Margot at the Wedding" gives way to Jonathan Demme's Cassavetes-styled uber family drama that centers around problem daughter Kym (Anne Hathaway) who takes a weekend leave from nine months in a rehab facility to participate in her sister Rachel's (Rosemarie DeWitt) biracial Connecticut wedding.
Kym steamrolls into her family's otherwise serene and musically festive atmosphere like a heat-seeking missile in dire need of special attention.
In spite of Rachel's inappropriate behavior, emotional outbursts, and violent acts, the wedding drowns out much of the sorrow that Kym carries as a result of killing her younger brother in a car accident when she was strung out on heroin some years earlier.
Jenny Lumet's finely tuned script provides for some of the most E
arth-shattering true moments of emotional expression to come out of independent cinema this year.
Jonathan Demme's home video approach to the loaded dramatic material gets a bit too shaky-cam at times, and the film's climatic post wedding festivities could have used a sharper edit, but this is a movie that transcends a very specific moment in American experience with humor, honesty, hope, and cynicism.
Keep an eye out for singer/songwriter Robyn Hitchcock's cool cameo as musical entertainment at the wedding.
(Sony Pictures Classics) Rated R. 116 mins.
