Film Review -- Silver Linings Playbook

This dramedy is directed by David O. Russell and stars Bradley Cooper, Jennifer Lawrence, Robert De Niro, and Jacki Weaver. Pat Solitano (Cooper) is a bipolar former teacher who, after spending ten months in a mental institution, moves back in with his parents (De Niro and Weaver) in Philadelphia and hopes to reconcile with his estranged wife, whose infidelity sparked his admission into treatment. While at dinner with some friends, he meets Tiffany (Lawrence), a young, sex-addicted widow who may be even crazier than he is, and who seems to be the only person who understands what Pat is going through. When Pat promises to be her partner in a dance competition in exchange for her facilitating communication with his wife, Tiffany begins to develop feelings for him, surely promising to complicate their already delicate situations even more. This film has been generating an incredible amount of buzz, proved by the slew of nominations it was awarded by the Academy, so I was very curious to see it. On most levels, it very much succeeds. At times it is sad, and at times it is hilarious; Cooper gives an unexpectedly strong performance, as does Lawrence, and the supporting actors are great; there is so much going on in the film, and yet the screenplay effectively covers it all in two hours. Obviously, the film isn't perfect, and the aforementioned screenplay does leave out some key questions (why does Pat want so desperately to reconcile with an unfaithful wife?), but overall, I thought that it worked really well. However, although a fine film, it is not even in my top three best films of the year -- behind Argo, Lincoln, and Zero Dark Thirty -- two of which directors (Ben Affleck for Argo and Kathryn Bigelow for ZDT) were not nominated for Best Director Oscars, while Russell was. There truly is nothing spectacular about the direction of Silver Linings Playbook, so I continue to find Russell's nomination as opposed to either Affleck or Bigelow to be the biggest Awards Season snub. Every other nomination, however (for all four actors, Adapted Screenplay, Best Picture, etc.) is well-deserved, and Cooper out-shined even the talented Lawrence; too bad the film came out the same year that Daniel Day-Lewis played Lincoln.

Should You See It: Yes
Grade: B+