craig lucas Tagged Articles at Cinematical

Dysfunctional families and indie films go together like peanut butter and chocolate, and Birds of America, directed by playwright Craig Lucas, has dysfunction in abundance. Morrie (Matthew Perry), who raised his younger siblings Jay (Ben Foster) and Ida (Ginnifer Goodwin) after their father's death, now lives in the family home with his wife, Betty (Lauren Graham). Morrie is a college prof desperately seeking tenure, and the person who is most in a position to make that happen for Morrie is his friend Paul (Gary Wilmes), who lives right next door with his wife, Laura (Hilary Swank), in their perfect house, with their perfectly maintained flower bed, with their perfectly adorable infant.

Morrie is one of those guys who carries the weight of the world on his shoulders, and he represses his emotions so tightly that the stress of it all has manifested itself in a case of constipation so extreme he has a home office set-up in his bathroom so he can work while trying to ... work all that out. Betty, meanwhile, wants desperately to have a perfect life and a child like Laura, but Morrie won't consider parenthood until he makes tenure. Since their whole future happiness is dependent upon whether Paul recommends Morrie for tenure, both Morrie and Betty go overboard in trying not to offend Paul and Laura -- even to the extent of not complaining that Laura's dog does his business in Morrie and Betty's yard. Unlike Morrie, the dog does not have a constipation issue, so they are constantly cleaning up after it.

Remember that indie comedy that Patrick Walsh blogged about last month? The Laws of Motion, as the flick is called, is Matthew Perry's latest attempt to find some solid, cinematic comedic success, and teams him up with everyone's favorite funny girl Hilary Swank... er, wait. The comedy is about a husband (Perry) in the typical adult male complex -- his job and community are suffocating him and he is "enduring headaches caused by his free-spirited brother and sister." Swank tops off the the man's pressure by playing the annoyingly-perfect neighbor. Ben Foster, who you might remember from his overly-emotional artist stint in Six Feet Under, or as the big-winged Angel in X3, was already cast as Perry's brother, and now there's a sister to boot.

The carefree sis will be played by Ginnifer Goodwin. If you're a cable television fan, you might recognize her from her time as Bill Paxton's third wife in the polygamist series Big Love. She's also the woman who played Vivian Cash in Walk the Line. Motion comes from the pen of Elyse Friedman, whose lone previous credit is the romantic drama Suddenly Naked, and will be the sophomore directorial stint for Craig Lucas, who last helmed The Dying Gaul. He's also the guy who wrote the mainstream Prelude to a Kiss, and the less well-known dysfunctional marriage movie with Campbell Scott called The Secret Lives of Dentists. This film, which is currently shooting in Connecticut, also has one more name on the roster over at IMDb -- Justin Long -- that cheerleading dork from Dodgeball and the cool, human embodiment of a Mac. Any bets on which way this comedy will go - big flop or funny success? I honestly have no idea.