ALLAN HUNTER at the Movies

WRITER and director Noah Baumbach’s The Squid And The Whale was one of the best films of the past few years, with dialogue that stung and characters that were flawed and complex.

Baumbach returns with Margot At The Wedding, an ambitious, tart-tasting ensemble exploring some unhappy middle-class lives and picking at the scars of sibling rivalry.

Margot (Nicole Kidman) is a writer who appears to have extended an olive branch to her sister Pauline (Jennifer Jason Leigh) when she agrees to attend her wedding. She arrives with her son and takes an instant dislike to the groom, Malcolm (Jack Black), who is simply not good enough for her sister.

When Pauline confides that she is pregnant, it is a secret that Margot cannot keep to herself. Her careless talk is the first of several betrayals in the days leading to a wedding that seems doomed from the outset.

Margot At The Wedding is full of characters you could either love or loathe. Margot is a manipulative monster who cannot see someone else’s happiness without wanting to destroy it or steal it as potential material for her fiction. In Nicole Kidman’s finely nuanced performance, she is also highly vulnerable and even sympathetic, especially when confronted with her own failings.

Pauline is the kind of character who should win all our sympathy but often seems her own worst enemy. The reason her sister can hurt her so much comes in the quiet realisation that she might just be speaking the truth.

It is quite a mannered film, and lacks the precision and instant appeal of The Squid And The Whale. However, it does have some fine performances and enough sour humour and sharp insights to make it worthwhile.

Selected Nationwide release

Director: Noah Baumbach
Stars: Nicole Kidman, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Jack Black, Ciarin Hinds, John Turturro, Zane Pais
Screenwriter: Noah Baumbach
Certificate: 15
Running time: 92mins
Country: USA
Year: 2007