johnpmoseley
Brilliant, funny meditation on the subtle, under-the-radar ways in which family members can inflict deep, lifelong hurt on each other. Beautifully drawn and played characters, fantastic cast, deeply satisfying story, many laughs. Hard to beat, you'd think, but maybe a lot of the low-raters here came hoping for the Sandler and Stiller of comedies like The Water Boy and Zoolander. Potential viewers like these, yes, probably don't bother, you'll probably be bored.
Matt Greene
Noah Baumbach is often unfairly accused of pretension & navel-gazing in his films. This is the first that I've really felt those critiques are warranted. Mostly a sob story of whiny yuppies & self-centered artists, the individually strong drama & comedy don't meld as well as they do in his better films (Frances Ha, Mistress America). Luckily all the performances, especially Sandler giving maybe his best turn ever, are so great that you could almost ignore the film's shortcomings.
Floated2
In comparison to Adam Sandlers other Netflix films, The Meyerowitz Stories is much greater and with better writing, acting and overall plot. Though this is labeled in some ways a comedy, it is mostly dramatic and somewhat depressing. The acting is great and the chemistry between Sandler, Ben Stiller and Dustin Hoffman work well, which is what elevates the film. Not too predictable but at times boring and feels as of not much is happening. Some critics have called this the "return of Adam Sandler" but the film being featured on Netflix doesn't quite fit a return. Perhaps this film should have went to theaters, as a wide audience could see.The Meyerowitz Stories (New and Selected), is the closest thing director Noah Baumbach has yet achieved to a departure from these recurrent factors in his work - he has peeled back some of the layers of detached character comedy to offer an emotionally affecting portrait of family life, that in its best moments, manages to be sincerely moving in a manner that feels regulatory for the director. This film has received overwhelming positive reviews from critics despite being a Netflix film.
jdesando
Plant an academic-artistic Jewish-American family in contemporary Manhattan, and you have neurotic conversation, bruising relationships, and repentance all learned from Woody Allen if not for real. Even more than Woody's endearing situations, this one is bloodier but more forgiving. Noah Baumbach's Meyerowitz Stories (New and Selected),a Netflix original, is touchingly funny about two Meyerowitz sons, musician Danny (Adam Sandler) and financier Matt (Ben Stiller) celebrating their mediocre-sculptor-professor father, Harold (Dustin Hoffman), and their constant jockeying for position with him and themselves. It's not a hilarious comedy, but the nerdy-New-Yorker motif shows it is still satisfyingly amusing.Baumbach perfectly tunes us to Danny's alienation from Dad and Matt's clueless realization of his role as favored one. Danny's opening sequence trying to find a parking spot in the East Village is an emblem of his consistent failures and the disintegration of the fractured family holding on to hopes about the deed for Dad's apartment.Most of what happens is off-center from the truth of things, as is probably true of most families whose perception of each other is skewered by family culture and parental politics. The dialogue is both banal and profound, just the way we all live except that few of us are Jewish or live in Manhattan, two invaluable elements that provide subtle hilarity. When feelings are exposed, the dialogue turns almost Eugene O'Neill-like.Most touching about these stories, which are chapters partly devoted to the three males, are almost seamless revelations about the family and their unspooling in a leisurely but sometimes devastating way. About the daily dialogue, Baumbach can't be bested, maybe except for Allen in his prime and Baumbach's girlfriend, Greta Gerwig, whose wispiness is gone from Baumbach here, but all the better for this urbane grit:
"Brian and James, who you've met..." Matthew
"Very charming interracial, homosexual couple, and smart about the work. They were familiar with Gilded Halfwing [Harold's prized but ignored sculpture]." Harold
AD
