If you can look past Liev Schreiber's beard and stop wondering when Sabretooth is going to kill everyone, this is an amusing and affecting little family drama. It's true that about an hour in when you realize the movie's message is nothing more than "Life sucks. Keep going", you'll get a brief sense that your time has been wasted. Get over that disappointment and stick it out to the end. Every Day doesn't have some sort of spectacular finish. That would be very out of step with its low key manner. The ending does give you a sense of completion that validates a viewer's investment. You have to savor these subdued performances and quietly clever story all the way through to fully appreciate them.Ned (Liev Schreiber) is a writer on an awesomely trashy TV medical drama. He's got a teenage gay son, Jonah (Ezra Miller), that he frets over and a sensitive pre-teen son, Ethan (Skyler Fortgang), that he tries to be patient with. Ned's also got a beautiful wife, Jeannie (Helen Hunt), who's just returned home with her elderly, ill and emotionally toxic father in tow. Ernie (Brian Dennehy) is the sort of stubborn, disconnected parent who can only seem to engage his children through criticism. As Ned worries about Jonah starting to date and has to deal with a wife perpetually angry from dealing with her father, he's also confronted by trouble at work and the temptation of a hot co-worker who has an unencumbered life that looks pretty good to Ned right now.This is an enjoyable and well made motion picture that employs and unfocused narrative to great benefit. Though Ned is the center of things, he doesn't dominate the story in any way. Not only are Jeannie's struggles with her father largely independent of Ned, but Jonah, Ernie, Ned's hot co-worker and even his demanding boss (Eddie Izzard) are all given their own little battles to deal with in the story. Those secondary story lines, however, reflect back onto what happens with Ned in a way that gives the film an unforced unity of emotion. Jonah's difficulty in dating validates Ned's concerns. Ernie grappling with his mortality seeps into Ned's brain and heightens his sense of being trapped. The things that attract Ned to his co-worker eventually blow up and make him appreciate his own life. His boss is not just a threat but the boss' uneasiness in dealing with his lover's teen son mirrors Ned's worries about Jonah, creating a potential link between the two that the audiences longs to see Ned connect.A lot of attempts at this kind of family drama get overpowered by one central character and one central theme, with all else reduced to window dressing. Every Day achieves an organic relatability without ever losing its way in meandering digressions. The film never gets caught up in trying to make this out to be the worst moment for Ned and his family or strains a muscle trying to elevate this family's story into some transcendent realm of meaning.Which is the only real problem with this movie. It's not edgy or intense or provocative of compelling. It's a pleasant hour and a half that maybe gives you a chance to take a breath and realize the problems in your life aren't quite as overwhelming as you make them out to be. Every Day lacks that "hook" to grab onto the viewer and pull itself of the crowded entertainment field. I can't imagine too many people hating this film and I can't imagine too many people loving it, but this sort of middle ground entertainment has a hard time find a foothold in today's cultural deluge.I'm glad I saw this film and how often can you really say that? Maybe instead of always going for the home run and usually striking out, we'd all be better off if more filmmakers did what Richard Levine does here and try to hit for average.

Great cast in a mostly typical domestic pot-boiler. You could probably write the plot yourself after the initial set-up, and the climax is conventionally contrived to happen all in the same night. Not quite as funny or dramatic as it might have been throughout. The son's homosexuality is realistically handled especially the dynamic between him and his dad. But Eddie Izzard's boss-man lives in a world that doesn't touch reality - even Reality TV. This plot line threatens to de-rail the whole enterprise for me What sort of TV show is this??? Hunt's best line was left on the cutting room floor "It's not porn. It's cable."

I was attracted to this film by the talented, no, the very talented cast. The lead roles and sporting roles were played superbly. It is not too sad but as sad as life generally has in store for all of us at some point, or in store for people close to us, close enough. The realism delivered by Brian Dennehy and Helen Hunt is as good as and better than any performances by other Oscar winners of this year and past. Liev Schreiber took on a most difficult role to play from beginning to end given the changes in the story's context that pertained to his character. He manages to stay the course, making the right moves so subtly that you have no reservation and no question about what feelings he conveys or even why the character is experiencing such feelings. Think about it. He uses very few words, his body language and facial expression never exaggerating the emotion but letting you know exactly what it is and what prompted it. His character is not transformed, it merely experiences what life has thrown in his path; his character proves to be a rock, not a saint. Ezra Miller and Skyler Fortgang play Hunt and Schreiber's sons and acquit themselves as well as the director could surely have hoped for, no less. They also make you believe what experience their characters are going through; the performances are not overdone, they are on the mark. We understand exactly what they feel. The sultry Carla Gugino plays her role very well; you don't hate her flawed character, you understand it and don't feel compelled to judge. I will now use a famous quote which I hope summarizes the parable I saw in the film, which is: Life unfolds as it should. I will recommend it to movie lovers who seek more from movies than the average audience. More of my friends will disagree than agree, but then again it takes a while to develop a taste refined enough for this genre of drama and this quality performance.

I found this piece to ring so true to family life in America today. I loved that it did not sugarcoat how hard it is to raise kids or help aging parents or keep a marriage fresh.This cast is superb and they have all brought their A game to the screen. They are reachable and poignant and they each have their own agenda that is faithfully followed throughout the story.I really see this as an ensemble piece and, therefore, don't want to single any one cast member out. They each delved into the details of their characters to bring a real slice of life to us. It was easy to get lost in the writing, the story, and the emotions we can all relate to with the deft ability of the cast and how they were directed.I highly recommend it.