ENOUGH SAID

ENOUGH SAID Review

By Darin Skaggs

     In the average romantic comedy it begins with a girl and a guy meeting.  Then they form a connection and have a great time together.  One of the two does something wrong and the other gets angry.  Then they break up, they’re both sad and eventually decide whether or not to get back together.  These are all the tropes of ridiculous films that follow a cliché list of bad filmmaking.  Nicole Holofcener’s Enough Said follows all these tropes but does them in a very realistic way.  She makes a great film with some great performances.

     The film stars Julia Louis-Dreyfus who plays Eva.  She is a mid-aged woman, she is a traveling masseuse, and she is divorced and kind of cynical.  At a party she meets Albert, played by James Gandolfini.  He asks a friend to give him her number.  At first she does not want to but then she gives in.  They go out and form a good bond.  At the same time Eva is giving massages to Marianne, who spends most of their time together complaining about her ex-husband.  It turns out that her ex is Albert.  Eva is conflicted with continuing her relationship or giving in to just being with Albert.

     The film story is not that great.  It is filled with moments that are pure coincidence, but has just enough to not feel realistic.  A lot of the moments do feel realistic, but there is just enough non-realistic to hurt the film.  The thing that makes this film great is the performances and most of the dialogue.  Dreyfus is amazing as Eva.  At times she is funny and likable and at other times you are debating if you would ever hang out with her.  Gandolfini does amazing, it is truly sad that he is gone because he clearly had a lot more different roles to perfect.  His character is constantly trying to be funny and at the same time you can see that he is sad.

     The story is very simple and does a lot of stuff other movies already have.  The film does it so well that it is a breath of fresh air.  The film is full of emotion.  There is sadness, glee and dread.  It makes bold moves to make the lead not so likeable at times, but then makes you realize that this is how people act at times.  It is an honest look at human relationship and a great romantic comedy.