Everybody's Fine (2009)

It's hard to see any effort in the film. There's no comedy to speak of, no real drama and, worst of all.

As somebody who had not heard any of this before, it became a curious phenomenon to sit and watch a film and slowly have the realities begin to click into place.

One of the worst ways to make a cult movie is to set out to make a cult movie.

This is a dark and sometimes deeply uncomfortable drama

"Everybody's Fine" is a film about a widower father reconnecting with his adult children spread across the U.S. Robert De Niro's Frank Goode apparently was a stern parent who pushed his kids to get ahead. But, in his retirement and loss of his wife, he longs for family connectedness that had always been provided by his wife. The kids could talk to her but not to him. This is a film about a dysfunctional family, with subsequent dysfunctions. The acting is mostly mediocre, with only De Niro giving a fine performance. The story becomes predictable as it unfolds. And, Frank's fear of flying is passé. By the 1990s, fear of flying was pretty much gone from the public consciousness. So, here, the hero takes to riding buses, trains, and catching a ride from a trucker. Instead of two- or three-hour flights from one city to another, Frank spends days on the road. Which slows the story down that much more, and needs filling with little anecdotes here and there with fellow passengers. All of that, combined with a dysfunctional family film makes for a mostly depressing and dull movie. By the 21st century, so-called "normal" or healthy families had become the exception. Hardly any family exists today that hasn't had some dysfunction with addictions or any number of social, health, mental or other problems. Most people don't flock to such films for entertainment. So, it's no wonder that the box office take for "Everybody's Fine" didn't come close to recovering its estimated $21 million budget.

Realistic, gentle, and a very common real life family drama. A Lonely widower travels across the ­states in a fraught attempt to round up his now grownup busy children for a ­family get-together since their mother's funeral. Wrapped around a pretty simple story yet very cleverly ­constructed. DeNiro gives a brilliant performance and still at his best while taking a calm, careworn, less iconic role. British writer-director Kirk Jones has persuaded him to turn the heat down. DeNiro plays Frank Goode - A retired guy with cardiac and ­ respiratory problems, struggling to keep up. With a strong ­ supporting cast, there is a third-act ­crisis that shares Frank's stunned ­incredulity. A film is overall very real, refreshing in a sense, yet very touching nonetheless.~ @asifahsankhan

"Everybody's Fine" directed by Kirk Jones, centers a widower (Robert De Niro) who realized his only connection to his kids was through his wife, so he sets out on a journey to reunite with his grown children.First of all, may I say the title is very misleading. The truth is, everybody is NOT fine.The movie begins with Robert De Niro preparing long and hard for his kids to come over for a cookout, until all his kids end up canceling on him last minute. Seeing an old man put in a lot of hard work only to be let down was not only very very sad but also very very depressing. I was hoping that maybe this movie had an "Up" type of plot, having the first 10 minutes super incredibly sad and then the rest of movie just gets better from there, but nope, I was wrong. So wrong.You would think the beginning is the worst part, but the truth is the movie just goes downhill from there, very downhill. I was hoping at some point there would SOME turn of events that would satisfy my broken heart for this old man, but that never happened.Although the movie ended with what seemed to be a "happy" ending, considering he DID get all the family together (well not ALL the family) I still wasn't recovered from the emotional damage the movie did to me, and the some-what "happy" ending sure didn't help it.I do believe the movie was very good, because any movie that makes me cry THAT hard is a movie that is well done. Robert De Niro was the star and his little innocent old man look really got to me. I would definitely watch the movie again, especially now that I know what I'm getting myself into.

Because my sister recommended this last year, I finally ordered this from Netflix and just watched it with my mom. It stars Robert De Niro as a recently widowed father who, having been told by three of his four grown children that they can't come home for the holidays, decides to visit them unexpectedly at where they all live. The three he visits are played by Kate Beckinsale, Sam Rockwell, and Drew Barrymore. The fourth is mostly referred to until near the end. I'll stop there and just say this was a nice change of pace for De Niro, usually known to me for his violent movies he made with Martin Scorsese, as he mostly gives a restrained performance here and pretty well, too. The others are also good in what their roles require of them. There are also some dream sequences of the offspring as children that also provided some interesting insights of what De Niro's character thinks and knows they're not telling him that I also liked. Oh, and Paul McCartney's song during the end credits was also touching. So on that note, Everybody's Fine gets a recommendation from me.