I'm a huge fan of Garden State and it took me a while to catch this movie. It looked so different than GS, and it is, especially in its dramatic tone. It was good to get back to old friends. We see a lot of familiar faces from GS, like Jim Parsons, Michael Weston, Ato Essandoh. I like the new perception of reality: it's OK to be saved sometimes, instead of being the hero all the time. Get things come to us, instead of chasing them again and again. I hope Zach Braff has the chance to make another personal movie soon. A good score on this one, ZB is great at choosing songs.

I really enjoyed this. I felt that it got better as it went. It was a movie w/ heart about the intricacies of family dynamics, and they really delved into what makes and breaks these intensely personal relationships.

If you look close enough you can probably see the numbers on the screen that the director used to "paint" this movie. Everything about this movie felt second-rate: the script, acting, delivery, etc. We've seen all of this done before, and much better. There is nothing wrong with the film (other than it feeling like it was 45 minutes longer than it really is) - there just isn't anything that stands out. follow me at https://IHATEBadMovies.com or facebook IHATEBadMovies

For some reason I could not get into this movie. The movie wants to be a celebration of life in the midst of a dying family member and life difficulties. I think I was irked by the way this movie pretends to include the religious experience in life's difficult journeys, but does not really engage with religion at all. Yes, there is a likeable character that is religious, but her religious experience is barely acknowledged, and for the most part religion is there merely to provide color and a feeling of niche-ness. The actual substantive claims of the faith and how they interact with difficulties in life are never really explored. I did notice something regarding the practice of religion. In the movie's family, the grandfather is religious, and the granddaughter is religious --- though not the grandson ---, but the sons are not religious. I.E. the movie seems to think that the children of baby boomers are drawn to religion far more than their parents. This is not the only evidence in popular entertainment of this trend: there were a few episodes of The Good Wife in which the daughter is shown as being far more literate about religion than the mother. Could the trend be or have been true? (In Europe the people who were protesting against gay marriage were young in significant numbers, and the Pro-Life movement certainly trends younger than the Pro-Choice movement). And is the trend over? Is the hunger for religion in the young being fed instead by the surfacing philosophy of gender sameness/irrelevance which permeates our modern society?