Movie Review: Darling Companion (2012) (PG-13)

A lost dog unites everyone

looking Dear Partner, I realized that the director and co-writer Lawrence Kasdan knew what he was looking for, but he had some trouble finding it. Oddly enough, this is surprisingly reminiscent of the movie itself, which tells the story of a group of people who have a lot of trouble finding a lost dog. All the characters know they want to find it, but reaching this goal will be a tremendous physical and emotional challenge. It’s a well-intentioned movie, using a reliable relationship plot and great actors giving decent performances, though I felt something was missing overall; it lacks the necessary flair capable of elevating its merely entertaining and moving premise to something more meaningful.

Before the story proper begins, we are introduced to various characters. First on the list are Beth and Joseph Winter, who have been married for many years and live comfortably in suburban Denver. Beth (Diane Keaton) has an empty nest, with one daughter who is already a mother and the other a university student. The latter, named Grace (Elisabeth Moss), is visiting during a break. Joseph (Kevil Kline) is a successful spine surgeon. In fact, he’s so successful that he’ll be spending a lot of time on his cell phone—longer than necessary, according to Beth. Despite many years of marriage, it’s obvious the spark is gone. Beth believes that Joseph is distant and a workaholic, while Joseph believes that Beth is too emotional, especially since her children have moved away.

The catalyst for the plot is a dog that Beth and Grace find abandoned on a road. Covered in somewhat bloody dirt, he is taken to a handsome young vet named Sam (Jay Ali), who immediately catches Grace’s eye. The dog is treated and Beth takes it home. Although she and Grace give him a bath, she makes it clear to Joseph that she has no intention of keeping the dog. But you know how things are in situations like this; a year later, he has been named Freeway and has become part of the family. So has Sam, who marries Grace at the family cabin in the Rocky Mountains. At this point, we meet Joseph’s sister, Penny (Dianne Wiest), and her new boyfriend, Russell (Richard Jenkins), who has a seemingly crazy idea to invest her money in a Midwestern English pub. . This doesn’t please Penny’s son Bryan (Mark Duplass), who works with his uncle Joseph as a surgeon.

The plan is to stay the weekend at the cabin. One morning, while Joseph is out for a walk on the Freeway, the former is distracted by a cell phone call, while the latter is distracted by a running deer. The highway leaves and disappears. While Joseph seems pretty nonchalant about it, Beth panics and launches a full-scale search and rescue effort, recruiting Joseph, Penny, and Bryan to the cause. She is accompanied by the cabin’s caretaker, a gypsy woman named Carmen (Ayelet Zurer), who recently lost a dog and claims to possess psychic abilities. Repeated visions of her, however vague and arbitrary, act as a guide for the group as they split up into teams and search the Freeway forest.

To deal with this right away, the subplot with Carmen doesn’t work at all. Regardless of whether she’s a kook or if she’s genuinely blessed with a third eye, this is a comedy/drama relationship, which is to say, this isn’t the kind of story that supports the inclusion of a character like this. It was a forced, random and unnecessary move on the part of the filmmakers. Complicating it further is the fact that Carmen quickly becomes Bryan’s love interest. Her mutual attraction stems from nothing becoming apparent to the audience other than the convenience of two individual characters being in the same space at the same time. As fashionable as it is to adhere to the rule that opposites attract, the simple fact is that they don’t seem all that compatible.

Carmen aside, it’s obvious what Kasdan and his wife/co-writer Meg are trying to do here. Dear Partner it’s not really about the search for a dog; it is about relationships in general and the processes of discovery and rediscovery. Through this experience, Beth and Joseph once again learn to communicate, and Bryan learns to see Russell as more than just a lofty dreamer and a leech on his mother. Everyone’s heart is in the right place. Of that I’m sure. Having said that, the film is at times quite muddled about its tone, shifting sharply from mild humor to serious drama, to sweeping physical gags and cartoonish profiles. Perhaps the film’s shortcomings are overshadowed by the audience’s desire to find the Freeway. You won’t get a word out of that.