Smart People (2008)

Dennis Quaid stars as a bitter, washed out widower in SMART PEOPLE, a film that tackles the lives of several seriously unhappy people in surprisingly funny and touching ways. A hated literature professor at Carnegie Mellon, Lawrence Wetherhold has been earning the scorn of his students, colleagues, and family since the death of his wife several years ago. The only person on his side is his teenage daughter Vanessa (Ellen Page), whose loyalty and similarities to her father belie her tender age. Between running the Young Republicans club and aiming for a perfect SAT score, the over-achieving high school student kno...
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ws no life beyond the insular world of family. When the film begins, the family dynamics are well established, with Lawrence merely going through the motions of his life, unable to muster up any passion for parenting or even his literary expertise. It takes a seizure, an unexpected visit from his adopted brother (Thomas Haden Church), and a new romantic interest (Sarah Jessica Parker) to shake things up and stir Lawrence from his constant misery.

Driven by a clever script and fine performances, SMART PEOPLE is set in the land of academia, a place where both Lawrence and Vanessa have taken refuge and plunged themselves into as escape from the external world. In spite of their high IQs, both father and daughter are equally clueless when it comes to navigating relationships. This becomes obvious as Vanessa develops a line-blurring relationship with her uncle, and Lawrence stumbles in romancing his doctor. If Vanessa wants a shot at happiness and Lawrence wants to make things work in his love life, both will have to adopt new attitudes or risk further alienation. Church is hilarious as Chuck, Lawrence's adopted slacker brother, adding a funny but heartfelt element to the otherwise serious film.
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Commercial director Noam Murro makes the leap to feature films with this comedy drama concerning an aging professor-turned-bitter eccentric due to the death of his longtime wife. Ever since his wife passed away, Lawrence Wetherhold (Dennis Quaid) has become overly acerbic and self-absorbed. He's alienated his son (Ashton Holmes) and transformed his daughter (Ellen Page) into a friendless overachiever. Now, at the precise moment Lawrence thought he had finally figured it all out, his life comes crashing down all around him as he falls for a former student (Sarah Jessica Parker) and his shiftless adopted brother (T...
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homas Haden Church) comes knocking on the door in search of a place to stay. Though Lawrence always relied on his intelligence to get him out of life's little jams in the past, it's going to take quite a bit more than intellectual thinking to move past this sticky stage in his suddenly chaotic life. David Denman and Christine Lahti co-star in this romantic comedy drama, which serves as the screenwriting debut of Goats and Modern Ranch Living author Mark Jude Poirier.
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Professor Lawrence Wetherhold might be imperiously brilliant, monumentally self-possessed and an intellectual giant--but when it comes to solving the conundrums of love and family, he's as downright flummoxed as the next guy. His teenaged daughter is an acid-tongued overachiever who follows all too closely in dad's misery-loving footsteps, and his adopted, preposterously ne'er-do-well brother has perfected the art of freeloading. A widower who can't seem to find passion in anything anymore, not even the Victorian literature in which he's an expert, it seems Lawrence is sleepwalking through a very stunted middle a...
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ge. When his brother shows up unexpectedly for an extended stay at just about the same time as he accidentally encounters his former student, the circumstances cause him to stir from his deep, deep freeze, with often comical, sometimes heartbreaking, consequences for himself and everyone around him.
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Weduwnaar Professor Lawrence Wetherhold is dan misschien een genie en intellectueel hoogbegaafd, als het aankomt of gezinsleven en emotie is hij net zo onhandig als ieder ander. Zijn dochter is een overambitieuze studente die in dezelfde hopeloze voetstappen van haar vader dreigt te treden en zijn geadopteerde broer heeft de kunst van het niets doen geperfectioneerd. Zelfs de Victoriaanse Periode waar Lawrence in gespecialiseerd is kan hem niet meer aanzetten tot grootse daden en hij is aan het slaapwandelen door zijn middelbare leeftijd. De ontmoeting met een voormalig leerlinge veranderen zijn kijk op het leven...
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