Starring: Steve Carell, Juliette Binoche, Dane Cook, Diane Wiest, John Mahoney
Director: Peter Hedges
Studio: Disney/Buena Vista
Video: 1.78:1 widescreen
Audio: PCM Uncompressed 5.1, Portuguese DD 5.1, Spanish DD 5.1
Extras: Deleted Scene, Commentary, Featurettes, Gag Reel
Subtitles: English, French, Spanish
Length: 98 minutes
Rating: ***1/2
Dan in Real Life is a pleasant enough movie about Dan, a widower and local newspaper advice columnist, who’s raising three girls and has very little life outside his family and his work. A meticulous father, he spends a great deal of time trying to raise his kids well, often to the consternation of his daughters, and essentially, completely neglects any semblance of “a life” of his own. The plot line revolves around an annual weekend family trip to his parent’s house to congregate with the entire extended family, and the various shenanigans that ensue. On the morning of the second day, Dan’s mom sends him into town for a newspaper; in a bookshop he meets Marie (Juliette Binoche), and the two strike up a conversation filled with lots of flirtatious tension that lasts into the early afternoon. Suddenly Marie gets a call on her cell phone, and has to leave immediately; Dan presses her for her phone number, and the two agree to meet again for a continuation of what seems to be a blossoming relationship. Dan ecstatically returns to his parent’s house, just as his brother is introducing his new girlfriend to the family; of course, it’s Marie, and the weekend suddenly becomes a very complicated affair for Dan and his entire family. What’s worse, over the course of the weekend, Dan learns that his advice column is being considered for national syndication; by the end of the weekend, he realizes that he’s broken just about every rule he preaches to his readers and family.
I found this movie an extremely entertaining watch, and I felt it really showcased Steve Carell’s talents as an actor. In one of the making-of featurettes, it’s revealed that due to Steve Carell’s TV series commitments, it was impossible for him to arrive on set any earlier than the day shooting commenced, and he had no rehearsal time; the other actors had been there nearly two weeks, and were already pretty much in character for the movie. Steve Carell is infinitely believable as Dan, however, and he really convinces you of his ethics and parenting skills, and especially of his vulnerability to potential relationships as a single father. It’s really odd to see him in a role where he’s likeable – in very stark contrast to his character on NBC’s The Office. Not only is the movie laugh-out-loud funny at times, but it’s also poignantly touching as Dan tries to cope with the really lousy hand he’s been seemingly dealt, all the while trying to keep his focus on his priorities: his family and his work.
From a technical standpoint, there were a couple of observations I made that ultimately prevented this movie from getting a much higher rating. A 50-gig, dual-layer Blu-ray disc, the movie only clocked in at a little over an hour-and-a-half, with a fairly routine offering of supplements. The audio options were fairly mainstream as well, with the uncompressed 5.1 soundtrack as the only really memory-intensive option there, and with this film being so dialogue-intensive, there’s very little action (if any) going on in the surrounds throughout most of the movie. So why is this Blu-ray disc the very slowest in my library to load – and I mean painfully slow! I realize that Blu-ray is still essentially in its infancy, but with a movie that has no CGI or special effects to speak of, no memory-sucking soundtrack ripe with bombs and explosions, and no incredible range of special features – why does this disc take so very long to load – upwards of five minutes or longer? Even the menus are among the most simplistic of any Blu-ray disc I’ve encountered up to this point. [and to think I was going to complain about Independence Day – loaded with Smart Menus – for taking three minutes to load! However, our reviewer Calvin Harding found Dan took only one minute to load on his PS3 player…Ed.]
— Tom Gibbs
