A REAL PAIN

A promising idea is let down by an script disappointingly low on emotion, character evolution and thematic heft in A Real Pain, which contains a handful of powerful scenes in a sea of mediocrity.

Writer-director Jesse Eisenberg was compelled to write A Real Pain, a story about finding purpose in your Jewish heritage, after a trip to Poland he undertook a decade ago and it is clear the tale is a very personal one to him. Unfortunately he fails to convey this successfully in a film that keeps the viewer frustratingly at a distance and struggles to make a coherent point.

Following two cousins who could not be more different on a week-long guided tour in Poland after the death of their grandma (who was of Polish-Jewish descent) A Real Pain borrows heavily from Woody Allen, Ira Sachs and Noah Baumbach, as the picture tries to find the perfect marriage of awkward humour, quirky, neurotic characters, and a strong thematic anchor.

The awkward humour is mostly a success, not so much because of the serviceable script but because of the interesting oddball pairing of Jesse Eisenberg and Kieran Culkin. The actors play well off each other to create an always entertaining if hardly original or long-term memorable dynamic. Still, while he is perfectly fine in the role, I found Culkin – who is bound for Oscar glory come March – lacking in the emotional department, while Eisenberg has done this kind of role before, and better at that.

Troublesome is also that this central duo takes up so much screentime that the supporting cast gets the short shrift. Specifically in the case of Kurt Egyiawan, who plays a Rwandan genocide survivor who converted to Judaism, this is a real shame as his character is undoubtedly the most interesting in the entire film and yet the role is so underwritten it plays out merely as background noise.

But the biggest mistake A Real Pain makes is that it thinks ambiguity and subtlety are interchangeable. By not making the picture’s themes more obvious and relatable, emotions are erased almost completely from the equation, which leads to a shrug-worthy final five minutes that feel like an enormous anticlimax.

release: 2024

director: Jesse Eisenberg

starring: Jesse Eisenberg, Kieran Culkin, Will Sharpe, Jennifer Grey