The idea behind the new American drama Smart People is that folks who’re blessed with brains don’t necessarily get a corresponding emotional intelligence.
Dennis Quaid is Lawrence Wetherhold, a widower and English professor who is, on his best days, only bitter and twisted about the world.
His ambitions to climb the college ladder are being frustrated, his students think he’s a jerk and no publisher will touch his most recent misanthropic manuscript.
Lawrence’s solace should be his family, but they’re also a maladjusted bunch. His poet son is remote, his teen daughter is adoring but a fascist, and his adoptive brother is a stoner freeloader.
Lawrence’s downbeat life starts to have an upside though, when he hits his head and is treated by a former student, Janet Hartigan, now a smart, attractive doctor. An unlikely romance ensues and everyone’s forced to take a long hard look at themselves.
Our protagonist reminds me of the slobby writers of Sideways and Wonder Boys, who needed the love of a good woman to bring them out of their shells. However, those characters had charm but Quaid too often plays Lawrence as little more than a doddering old grouchy pants. It’s hard to believe Sarah Jessica Parker’s Janet would persevere with him, but, that said, she gives a highly enjoyable performance.
Thomas Haden Church’s insouciant brother Chuck gets droll laughs, and Ellen Page offers another sharp-tongued teen. Their dialogue crackles, even if we don’t always believe their characters’ motivations and actions. And the eldest son, Ashton, falls off the film’s radar too often.
Smart People continues two mystifying American movie trends. There’s the unplanned pregnancy, dealt with firmly in Hollywood’s pro-life parameters. And, like Juno, the movie crams its soundtrack with indie folk music, this time from Australia’s Suzie De Marchi and her husband Nino Bettencourt. It’s too much of a good thing - sometimes silence works better.
