Smart People (2008)

Into the life of a widowed professor comes a new love and an unexpected visit from his adopted brother.

Director:

Noam Murro

Writer:

Mark Poirier (as Mark Jude Poirier)

Stars:

Dennis Quaid, Thomas Haden Church, Sarah Jessica Parker

3 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Dennis Quaid	...	Lawrence Wetherhold
Sarah Jessica Parker	...	Janet Hartigan
Thomas Haden Church	...	Chuck Wetherhold
Ellen Page	...	Vanessa Wetherhold
Ashton Holmes	...	James Wetherhold
Christine Lahti	...	Nancy
Camille Mana	...	Missy
David Denman	...	William
Don Wadsworth	...	Hadley
Robert Haley	...	Roth
Patrick Sebes	...	Curtis
Kevin James Doyle	...	Rodney
Paul Huber	...	Ben (as Paul J. Huber)
Iva Jean Saraceni	...	Volunteer
Richard John Walters	...	Parking Lot Attendant

Storyline

Lawrence Wetherhold is miserable and misanthropic: he's a widower, a pompous professor at Carnegie Mellon, an indifferent father to a college student and a high-school senior, and the reluctant brother of a ne'er-do-well who's come to town. A seizure and a fall send Lawrence to the emergency room where the physician, a former student of his, ends up going on a date with him. His daughter, Vanessa, lonely and friendless, who's been bonding with his brother, tries to sabotage dad and the doctor's relationship, but Lawrence is good at that without help. Is there any way these smart people can get a life? Can happiness be pursued beneath layers of irony?

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Plot Keywords:

drinking from a bottle | student | professor | emergency room | high school | 

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Taglines:

Sometimes the smartest people have the most to learn

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Genres:

Comedy | Drama | Romance

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Motion Picture Rating (MPAA)

Rated R for language, brief teen drug and alcohol use, and for some sexuality

Details

Official Sites:

Official Facebook Official site

Country:

USA

Language:

English Spanish

Release Date:

11 April 2008 (USA)

Also Known As:

Una familia genial

Filming Locations:

Pittsburgh International Airport, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA

Box Office

Opening Weekend USA:

$4,092,465, 13 April 2008

Gross USA:

$9,511,289

Cumulative Worldwide Gross:

$11,843,604

Company Credits

Production Co:

Miramax, Groundswell Productions, Sherazade Film Development

Technical Specs

Runtime:

95 min

Sound Mix:

DTS Dolby Digital SDDS

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Sarah Jessica Parker and Thomas Haden Church appear together in Divorce, HBO 2016.

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Goofs

Royalties from a book on literary criticism would not pay for a Stanford education.

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Quotes

Lawrence Wetherhold: Just go home and get some sleep, and get the perfect SAT score.
Vanessa Wetherhold: That's what I've been trying to do.
Lawrence Wetherhold: mercurial...
Vanessa Wetherhold: I learned that word in the 5th grade.
Lawrence Wetherhold: fecundity...
Vanessa Wetherhold: Ah, English is my first language.
Lawrence Wetherhold: uxorious...
Vanessa Wetherhold: That's appropriately obscure - mind you I know it. Overly fond of one's wife.
Lawrence Wetherhold: That's my girl.
Janet Hartigan: I have a good one. eft...
[...]

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Connections

References Charlie Rose (1991)

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Soundtracks

Stitch
Written by Suze DeMarchi
Performed by The Baby Animals
Courtesy of Candirose Pty Ltd.

User Reviews

Familiar, but well done dramedy featuring some stellar performances

An indie comedy about a quirky family of self-hating misfits. We've seen this before, am I right? Well, so what, I say. When it's done well, I don't care too much whether the concept has been done before. And Smart People is done quite well. Dennis Quaid stars as a college professor and widower who hasn't been out with a woman since his wife died an unspecified (but long) amount of time ago. He lives alone with his daughter (Ellen Page). He has a son who goes to the same college at which he teaches and an adopted brother (Thomas Haden Church) who likes to mooch off of him. After an accident, Church moves in with Quaid and Page. Quaid also meets a former student (Sarah Jessica Parker), now a doctor, who had a crush on him. They start to date. The plot isn't anything special, but the dialogue is witty and the relationships are well observed. And this is also a case of fine actors who make something merely serviceable into something special. Quaid has never been better. My feeling about his work as an actor is that he is very uneven. He can be excellent, such as in The Right Stuff, but usually he's adequate, and often, perhaps too often, he's awful. But this is definitely one of the excellent performances. Church has kind of a sitcommy role, but that's fitting for an actor who was really good in sitcoms. He's hilarious here, too. A lot of the time, I was thinking of the movie as somewhat akin to a sitcom, but a good sitcom. There have been such things, you know. Page, fresh off her star-making turn as Juno (though Smart People was filmed earlier), is an actress I've liked in a couple of movies I disliked (Juno and Hard Candy). Finally, a movie with her that I actually like! Feels good. And she's great in it. The character is similar to Juno, but not quite so despicably precious. I like how the writer and director invite the audience to dislike all four of the major characters, at least a bit. They are recognizable people, which is, unfortunately, a rarity in movies. I liked the movie, and recommend it.