Another RomCom about a man and two women - his ex-wife and his girlfriend. But the strength here is the third woman, his 18 year old daughter, and his relationship with her. Because that makes this movie much deeper.
First the romance and the comedy. Julia Louis - Dreyfus plays Eva a massage therapist who may or may not be looking for love. She finds both at a party where she meets her new best friend Sarah as well as Eva's soon to be new boyfriend Albert (James Gandolfini). Who knew that Sarah and Albert used to be married? When Eva finds this out, she spends the rest of the movie trying to cover it up, with predictable results.
Albert is pretty well over his ex, but Eva seems to try and pick out what went wrong, as if she wants to find things wrong with Albert. On the surface, that's not too hard (physical, particularities, and such).
But Albert is a more grounded man than that as related to his daughter Tess. Some good things:
When Eva notices another woman's expensive purse, Albert tells her it is his daughter's, a present for her 18th birthday. Now Eva is doubly jealous.
When Eva asks where is Albert's car, he says that Tess car had to go in the shop and she has a loaner. Why isn't Tess driving the loaner? Well, Tess likes Albert's car better.
Sarah bashes Albert for wanting to take Tess to the airport to go to college.
When the reveal comes for the farce, Albert is most bothered by the fast that it happened in front of Tess.
Finally a movie where the dad is not the clueless imbecile when it comes to children. As a result we see Eva as much more childlike, jealous of the other teenagers, wanting to be their friend, the permissive mom. She nitpicks as to Albert because he is an adult, and she is trying to become one (speaking up about the table for example).
* * 1/2 but James Gandolfini might be a Heath Ledger effect come Oscar time.
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