This is a very good film, one of the best I've seen in years. It really captured grief about losing a dear loved one. Not only is the husband grieving after losing his wife of 33 years, and it's very hard to let go of the memories, but also the son is grieving missing his mom a lot. Well written script and superb acting. In our home no eye stayed dry. We truly enjoyed this movie as it captured the emotion of the loss of a loved one so vividly. Great California Hwy 1 scenery and an early 70's Mustang convertible were a nice touch too.

When you look at the summary for this film it barely mentions that it is dominated by depression. J. K. Simmons does a wonderful job of portraying someone who is grieving and has fallen into depression after the loss of his wife. My problem with the film is the therapist and patient relationship. The therapist immediately puts Simmons on drugs and then we see him go through varies other drugs and then finally electro shock therapy. The whole time Simmons allows the therapist to just lead him down this path of destruction. He finally decides to not give into his depression any longer when he and his son have a huge fight. This is so Hollywood, taking a serious subject like depression and making light of it. They could have illustrated what is so clearly wrong with our mental health system, but instead they make it seem like all the drugs and shock therapy helped, when clearly it was all up to him. This film makes me mad.

Bill Palet (J.K. Simmons) is still depressed by the death of his wife a year earlier. He and his teen son Wes (Josh Wiggins) move out of their home and into a new life at a private school. Wes is partnered with troubled Lacy Westman (Odeya Rush) who has dysfunctional parents getting divorced but stubbornly still live together. The kids' french teacher Carine (Julie Delpy) try to heal their wounds.The kids are great. This could be a great high school drama if the movie could skew more towards them. I don't have anything against Delpy and Simmons. On the contrary, they do great work with their roles. Nevertheless, it does pull focus away from the kids. It leaves the story telling scattered. I don't know much about filmmaker Kurt Voelker. He seems to get some good work from his actors.

For me this movie hit close to home as my sister and I lost our mother suddenly, when we were young, and at a time we were expecting many more years of love! I am sure this is the case for many losing a parent can be a hard fact of life at any age. J.K. Simmons always seems to rise to the occasion of any role he plays. This one is no different as you feel like you experience the pain with him at moments in the movie. Great effects as just like in real life there are memories that trigger the hardship of losing a loved one, and it is sometimes hard to get your balance! I felt the story as a whole was very well done as it starts out with J.K. Simmons taking his son packing up, moving, and trying to start elsewhere by leaving the home that him and his wife spent over 30 years in. As we all know running away from something doesn't help until we face tragedy head on. Some great acting also by Josh Wiggins (who I recently saw in Walking Out) who plays the son. I though the cast was well thought out, and and the movie gets support from all of them with some great acting. I especially liked the part of Carine who is played by Julie Delpy, many of you might remember her playing Carine in the Before Sunrise, Sunset, and Midnight Trilogies. Also her being French and being cast as the French Teacher in this one was a brilliant move. All in all an experience well worth watching as I liked the way the movie developed and took us all on a memorable ride and experience. Like I said one that many of us have been taken on a similar ride in a part of life that can be tragic and one that we deal with in many different ways. This one exposes many of the other characters realizing we all are dealing and surrounded by other's who can be hurting from life in different ways. Again a great Heartfelt triumph, very well done!!