DVDs in Review

Everybody’s Fine (Kirk Jones, 2009)

Title: Everybody’s Fine (Kirk Jones, 2009)

Release date: June 28 2010

Certificate: 12

Format: DVD

RRP: £11.99

Rating: 3.5/5

Reviewed by Dave Lancaster

In a way, this is the Robert De Niro film his diehard fans have been waiting for. Even his recent collaboration with Al Pacino (‘Righteous Kill’) misfired after they both worked together so well in ‘Heat’ back in 1995. ‘Everybody’s Fine’ may not blow anyone away, but it is a return to form and back into the kind of small scale drama genre he has previously triumphed on before falling back on cheap laughs or gunfights.

De Niro plays Frank Goode – a widower who attempts to get all his (now fully grown) children to meet up for meal at his house. As the date approaches all four of them leave messages backing out, prompting the lonely frank to hit the road and go and surprise them with a visit one by one.

Along the way he chats to whoever will listen about his old job as a man who coated telephone lines with a paint that the weather couldn’t breach. Director Kirk Jones adds in plenty of shots of telephone phones and silhouetted lines throughout Frank’s journey – it’s a simple metaphor that works well for this film which primarily concerns itself on lines of indirect, impersonal communication.

Three solid actors play Frank’s estranged children – Drew Barrymore, Kate Beckinsale and Sam Rockwell – and all deliver fine performances. It’s interesting how they don’t share many common traits, showing that they’ve all truly gone their own ways.

Frank meanwhile wants them all to return to the fold as he slowly realizes that it was his wife who held the family together, always lending an ear while Frank just forcibly told them to become great in their chosen professions. He pushed them too hard and now he’s delicately trying to lure them back into his life, but is he strong enough?

‘Everybody’s Fine’ plays more like a montage, but it’s held together by the performances and the restrained direction of Jones (who wrote the script based on the Italian film of the same name). As expected, it’s De Niro who serves up all the observant touches of character and he holds pretty much the entire film effortlessly.

Although, ironically, he seems somewhat miscast. This is the kind of film that would’ve tailored to Jack Lemmon’s ‘everyman’ vulnerability, rather than De Niro’s more doggedly committed professional types. Still, it’s refreshing to see De Niro try new directions, especially given his recent output.

Without a romance subplot or much in the way of humour, ‘Everybody’s Fine’ is a hard sell when it comes to being uplifting. Interest is maintained by a plot device which sees one of Frank’s sons missing due to a drugs charge in Mexico while his siblings cover it up from him. This subplot also adds a bit of mystery and stops the film from becoming overly preachy and completely emotional without having any actual story as a backbone.

Ultimately, ‘Everybody’s Fine’ is short on the story front, but we get to care about De Niro’s character right up to the film’s satisfying conclusion (which culminates in an above average Paul McCartney original song).  The DVD contains an interesting featurette which follows McCartney’s song from its genesis until its orchestral overdub.