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Smart People (2008)

Director: Noam Murro

Time Out rating

Average user rating

7 reviews

Movie review

From Time Out London

Bearing a ‘From the Producer of “Sideways’’’ poster credit on its back, Noam Murro’s haughty, self-consciously erudite, Sundance-stained comedy shows there are few more annoying traits in cinema than clever people done badly. Dennis Quaid struggles to convince as a Midwestern professor out to bag a publishing deal for his swollen tome of confrontational critical theory. His vacant emotional incubus of a daughter, Ellen Page has to secure a place at an Ivy League university while fending off Sarah Jessica Parker’s amorous advances towards her emotionally crippled pops.

Though the film makes the all-too-hamfisted point that book smarts and people smarts are different kettles of oily fish, you don’t for one minute believe – as you do with ‘Sideways’ and ‘The Squid and the Whale’ – that any of these characters demonstrate genuine intelligence beyond smug eyebrow raising, pointless rhetorical quips and nasty grammar fascism. And it’s slathered in an awful soundtrack of coffee-table acoustica that makes Sheryl Crow sound as heavy as Motörhead.

Author: David Jenkins

Time Out London Issue 1969, May 15-21, 2008

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User reviews of this film

Ollie Goodall said...

Posted on Oct 31 2011 01:10 Smug beyond belief. A poor stab at the indie, and looking to more than break even. The music is simply cloying and attempting to hide the missing warmth. The likes of Page, Haden Church simply don't have the material that would otherwise have helped us sympathise. Annoying because there are elements that in the right hands (a script rewrite) would have been easier to swallow. I give it a grade C

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Ronnie Campbell said...

Posted on Aug 26 2008 07:57 I despair. To call this review reasonable and intelligent is a diservice to the reader. I saw this film and relished the superb acting from all concerned and would certainly recommend it to anyone of average intelligence.
This reviewer is lost in the chasm of his (her) own verbosity and provides unreliable reports. This rep[ort would turn viewrs away from what is a tremendously well-acted film. Shame on you!

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Ronnie Campbell said...

Posted on Aug 26 2008 07:57 I despair. To call this review reasonable and intelligent is a diservice to the reader. I saw this film and relished the superb acting from all concerned and would certainly recommend it to anyone of average intelligence.
This reviewer is lost in the chasm of his (her) own verbosity and provides unreliable reports. This rep[ort would turn viewrs away from what is a tremendously well-acted film. Shame on you!

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usman said...

Posted on Jun 15 2008 16:39 so far this year the best social contemporary observation on modern behaviour and familial affiliations,somewhat cliched but enough origonality to make it winsome ,quaid was superb as the arrogant erudite scholar who bumps into an old student after a freaky funny accident in the ER room ,as if parkers romance or rather face to face conversations as they call them is not enough insight into our attitudes to relationships we also have a pot -smoking ,redundant uncle join this family of widower dad,smart but caring daughter and smarter but underplaying son who is a budding poet,
the plot unfolds with some really smart lines and the best satire on modern sexual attitudes with ellen page trying to seduce her uncle in a drunken moment and the hostility that develops between quaid and sarah as she finds herself pregnant ,
this is a wise script as it then does not wreck itself by dooming it's smart characters as we have seen enough of that but rather redeems them in a moment of salvation for the miseries of our robotic lives ,the clones the characters were developing into as a perception of reality as in reality per se is interrupted and the liberation comes in an ingenious moment of joy and truth .
i think it was quaid's best act since far from heaven and i forgave him for vantage point ,also ellen page played a jealous,embittered and protective daughter extremely well ,better then in juno -truly this was a more intelligent version of the modern teen age female version ,her contrived lines suited her here as she derives herself as a role model from her father ,
sarah has the best role and she is superb as she walks out on the first date and then pretends to having been paged after the intercourse in a moment of panic ,
it was really great as she turns up uninvited on the x-mas family dinner,with the brother -sister banter to entertain us a bonus .
the small details of the student-teacher interaction and the reading of the feedback reactions was true -to life and hilarious,the movie was so well executed i forgave or even forfeited it's few flaws like the happy ending which was actually a real smart move as we the audience are entitled to some serious dramas giving us a respite from the doom of our mundane ,smart but robotic lives ,i hope that hollywood indulges in these somewhat origonal and pleasant incursions into the insights of our minds more often as i thoroughly enjoyed this movie and ,it was the trivia which made it delightful like sarah telling quaid -you do not know how to use a condom -or the neurologist telling sarah that the hospital is litterred with the wake of her dating disasters,
not to mention the female english teacher exclaiming her students are more interested in her sexuality then her teaching skills -the smartest drama so far this year

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usman khawaja said...

Posted on May 26 2008 11:50 smart movie made by smart people for smart people -do not miss it if you are smart enough to enjoy smart scripts with smart men and smart women -otherwise you might begin to smart with the silly willy indiana jones which got 3 stars and this only 2 -that was rather not so smart -never mind =get smart-go watch it

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loser. said...

Posted on May 17 2008 15:21 I really thnk this film deserves better than 2 star. Its quirky and ellen page adds a really intresting, funny character.

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Phineas Tuesley said...

Posted on May 17 2008 10:57 Reading this causes me to reflect that there are few more annoying traits in review writing than cleverness done badly.

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