Please Give

Reality Check
A story with real people living really honest lives. Yes you could call Please Give a Reality Check! Especially since I can’t count how many times whilst watching the movie that I said the following phrase “That is exactly what really does happen….”.

Two different families living in fast paced Manhattan, both searching for meaning out of life. Family #1: Cathy (Elizabeth Keener) and Alex(Oliver Platt) own an upscale furniture store filled with post-death furniture bought for dirt cheap prices, that they turn around and sell at wildly expensive rates. Cathy eases the guilt of what she does for a living by giving out money to every homeless person that she sees. Alex is bored of…life. He’s bored of his job, his wife, his hobbies, and decides to find “other” avenues of interest.
Family #2: Rebecca(Rebecca Hall)and Mary(Amanda Peet) are sisters who are single, working, and taking care of their elderly grandmother, who just happens to live next door and rents from Alex and Cathy (Family #1, stick with me here). Rebecca works in the medical field and is a soft-spoken do-gooder who you can’t help but love. Mary is a self-absorbed, vein, mouthy spa therapist who spends her time stalking her ex-boyfriends new woman.

And roll the credits.

Don’t hold your breath for me to give a summary of the event, which changed all of their lives, because there isn’t one. Please Give is not a story about these two families interwoven around some beautiful plot. It’s a movie based solely on character development. We get to live with these characters for a short time; after all it’s living life that gives meaning to living life! Which is what writer/director Nicole Holofcener tries to convey in this movie. Well it worked. I fell in love with these characters, my friends! They were bitter, and cynical, and messy, and funny. They were real! My favorite scene was the dinner scene where they are all trying to get to know each other but it ends up being one of those very awkward dinners. I wanted the scene to never end because of the witty banter going on between all six characters. I liked Please Give, but would the movie have been better if there would have been just a small plot, a sub-plot, a mini-micro-plot? I haven’t quite decided. But one thing that I do know is that the characters danced a well-choreographed dance that I couldn’t tear myself away from.

Motherly AdviceIn order to avoid nudity and some pretty hefty swearing, you’ll want to have your filters set on High. The movie contains implied extramarital sex, alcohol consumption, death, and some pretty nasty dysfunctional relationships. I would recommend Please Give for ages 15 and up.

Trisha~Sometimes reality really does bite!