I love this move so much that it's not easy for me write an objective review. So I'll write a subjective one. A sort of a panegyric.I've seen this movie a couple of times. The last time I watched it was with a soon-to-get-married friend. I insisted on watching it. He was later thankful for it. I really believe this movie can improve your relationship with a romantic partner.I don't think anyone could've played Jack Campbell better than Nicolas Cage. He appeared funny to me even when that clearly wasn't his aim. The chemistry between Lea Leoni and Nicolas is amazing. It's as if this movie was based on their actual relationship. Jeremy Piven has done a great job playing Arnie - the buddy guy! The Family man is one of the rare movies which highlight the not-so-nice side of success and being on top in contrast to happiness and fulfillment family brings.Writers David Weissman and David Diamond didn't leave anything out when it comes to portraying the world in which parents live. How do you raise your kids, do a full time job, maintain relationship with friends, do household business, every night take your dog for walk, and, most importantly, build a great relationship with your spouse? Wouldn't all that business take away the time necessary to build THE career and life's comfort? We might think we don't need all of the above.And that's exactly what Jack Campbell had thought as well.

I always tell myself that the final goal of my life is to have a happy family. The way achieve that is to work hard, giving my wife and my children great living environment, which including a nice house, good food, great education chance and so on. these all stuffs are required money. Therefore, in my opinion, working hard and making more money is important.However, after viewing this movie-the family man, I start thinking that am I missing the right track? Do I really know what is the most essential part? Sometimes I am so confuse.The Jack, the main character in this movie, the main reason for him to go abroad is to have a better career, which means a better salary to have a better life with Kate. But the funny thing is that this is exactly the reason they broke up.Maybe, I think, is that having a happy family is not the ultimate goal for Jack, and maybe that is a nice sugar coat for Jack to chase his real goal, like making more money, meeting better world. Because normally, the ultimate goal means the NO.1 thing, the most priority thing that nothing could compare with, if there is a alternative question, you should go with this goal without any doubt.Apparently, staying with Kate is not for Jack, or they won't broke up. So, that will make me think what is the best for my future family? Is going abroad to make more money the best for my future family? Or staying with my girlfriend by missing the excellent career chance? I found the answer in this movie. The answer is love. Love is an amazing thing, it is not about creating something for each other, it is about scarifying for each other for staying with each other. just like the movie said, "I choose us", not a personal purpose, not a personal thought like "oh I think this is the best for us." something like that. It is always about "us", living together, solving problems together, facing difficulty together, raising kids together and so on. If there is a moment that will possibly separate "us", we should reject this moment, we should stick around with each other.Of course, it is not only required love, but also a rational mind, you could not purely choose "us" because you are afraid of lonely, because you just thinking yourself. There could not be a little selfish mind. The choice have to be made rationally by love.I am a person who also choose to abroad for better education, and that would maybe spent 2 years without seeing my girlfriend. But, After viewing this movie, I will still stick with my choice, because I really start understanding what is real means of my ultimate goal. I know maybe sometimes I will miss the right track, fortunately, there is a movie that could always remind me, that could always make me thinking, that could always teach me, this movie is named The family man.

(56%) One of Bret Ratner's better films, which although doesn't mean that much, as he's a bit of a hack; but there are much worse out there in bowels of Hollywood. Nic Cage is given plenty to get his teeth into playing both a soulless yuppie and as a blue collar everyman in what is essentially a play around with Dickens' a Christmas carol. Tea Leoni is well worth a mention as Cage's long lost love, but this just doesn't have enough to get it into the upper level of good movies. It's all just a little too neat at times, the structure too much like a TV movie. But this is still, despite a few key issues, sickly sweet, well shot, and the ending is somewhat charming.

"The Family Man" sets up to be an excellent and thoughtful dark comedy, incorporating and twisting the holiday themes of both "A Christmas Carol" and "It's a Wonderful Life," before copping-out at the end for a "Hollywood Ending" that makes little sense. But outside of the last 15 minutes, the movie is extremely intriguing.Our protagonist is Jack, a complex character played excellently by Nicolas Cage in one his best performances. Jack leaves his college girlfriend, Kate (played by Tea Leoni) to pursue a big career in business. Only 14 years later Jack has achieved tremendous success, being a young, top executive among the big corporations of New York City. Like Ebenezer Scrooge, Jack has dedicated his life to business success, but unlike Scrooge, he is not a wretched, isolated man. Jack is fulfilled, social and deliriously happy with his life.Like George Bailey from "It's A Wonderful Life," Jack becomes a person of interest for an Angel who has the ability to show our protagonists a "glimpse" of a different life for the purpose of turning their lives around. But unlike the comedic buffoon Clarence, who descends to save a suicidal George Bailey, Jack's angel (played with a delightfully sinister edge by Don Cheadle), takes notice of Jack, in a perverse twist, only because of a good and brave deed perpetrated by Jack. Jack's glimpse is to see a life where he didn't leave his college girlfriend. No longer among the elite, Jack must orient himself in a life 14 years mired in mundane family life in suburban New Jersey. Comedic mayhem ensues but the capable Jack perceives the aspects of family, hearth and home that he has missed in the penthouses of NYC skyscrapers.And just as Jack embraces the virtues of family life, the glimpse is over and the Angel arrives to send Jack to his old life. And Jack returns to the life he had loved with such absolute certainty but now feeling the emptiness of loss. And the movie asks the question, is this redemption? At the end, Scrooge joyously carries Tiny Tim on his shoulders through the streets of London, George Bailey runs home to be saved by his wife and friends. But if we can argue that Jack is the better man, is he happier?Had the movie ended here, the ending would be deliciously dark and controversial, but true and complete, a kind of Twilight Zone Christmas Carol. The audience might hope that Jack could go and start a different, more balanced life. But the powers that be decided to end the film with Jack finding Kate and trying to undue the mistakes of old. But how would this work? Kate has no experience of Jack's glimpse, and even if she did, they would be different people and the children would not be the same. There is no way to have those 14 years back. Because this makes no sense, the ending feels cheap and manipulative like some Studio Executive mandated a happier ending, ridiculousness notwithstanding. The unacceptable ending notwithstanding, the bulk of the film is both complex and funny and worthy of repeated viewings.