Florence Marr (Greta Gerwig) is the Greenberg family nanny in L.A. The family goes on a trip while the brother Roger Greenberg (Ben Stiller) drops by to housesit. She's young trying to find her way. He's a New Yorker misanthrope just out of an insane asylum. He doesn't drive and writes complaint letters. His friend Ivan Schrank (Rhys Ifans) pushes him to go to Eric Beller (Mark Duplass)'s barbecue where he runs into ex-girlfriend Beth (Jennifer Jason Leigh) with her kids. Roger, Eric and Ivan were once in a band but Roger refused to sign a recording deal. Florence and Roger have an on-and-off relationship.

Ben Stiller is going too dark. It's a matter of slight miscalibration. This could be a great indie rom-com but I can't find any likability to Roger. His dialog could have some sharp sarcastic jokes to take off the edge. I need to laugh with him but his dark depressed nature keeps getting into the way. Getting angry over his birthday is probably the only laughable moment although saying Florence's emotional story is pointless gets a small chuckle. His anger needs to have more comedy as an outlet and to balance his dark side. It has some good moments but it could have been better.

Greenberg coasts along. It's hard to describe it as being something more than that, and believe me, I want to. Noah Baumbach is a talented guy who can get inside himself and spring to life as a personal filmmaker - we wouldn't have The Squid and the Whale, which is wonderful work, if not for that - but following his mixed-bag of Margot at the Wedding comes Greenberg, a film that eschews the gray look of that film for a more sunny (er, Californian) look. But even that film had something to say, and some passion amid its missteps. With Greenberg, Baumbach is crafting a Woody Allen picture, or perhaps a movie he'd like to think of as in that style: self-absorbed characters, or at least one of whom can't relate to those around him and is neurotic and glum and sees the world as a miserable place (at least for the moment). And it deals with relationships the man Roger Greenberg has with a woman and his old band-member friend.

I do want to be interested in Greenberg, and in his potential development as a character. But nothing really changes in the film. He starts practically the way he started, except that he's led on a 20-something who's the assistant of his brother-in-law (out of town while Roger house-sits),and may want to avoid visiting California for a while. Sometimes the film is funny, or just amusing, but it's not often as Baumbach might think (it's not a laugh-out-loud funny, more like a "oh, haha" kind of funny, which is fine in some cases). And mostly he relies on his actors to carry it through, which Stiller is game for (and he's actually very good in the role, for what he's given),as is Rhys Ifans in his scenes as the band-mate. Greta Gerwig, who has previously been in Mumblecore movies, is just totally and tonally flat here as the would-be girlfriend.

It's like Baumbach took the ingredients of a film like by Allen, or just by anyone making a thoughtful character tragi-comedy, but didn't see how he could really make it interesting past some of the sour observations of present culture and old age and life in general. I hate to throw around this term, and it's not done lightly, but the film is rather self-satisfied with itself as it goes on. It's hard to describe it, and it's not the same as self-indulgent, which is something that I try and encourage and appreciate in film work (where would most of the great auteurs be if not self-indulgent?) But there's a smug attitude to the characters, even as we're meant to care about how bad or just unsatisfying their lives are, be they Stiller or Gerwig or Ifans characters. So much diatribe and talk that is cold, and not in the way that's meant to be ironic or observational or whatever.

And I don't even mean that it's tough to watch or boring... actually, some of it is kind of boring. It's the kiss of death to put it on a film, especially one with a filmmaker who knows what he's doing (or should know),but it just fell flat overall. Die-hard Stiller fans may get a kick out of seeing him back in dramatic territory - his first real big showcase for his not-intentional-comedy since Permanent Midnight - but may sour on him being unlikeable, plus lacking an arc. Not a big failure, but a mediocre entry in an artist's catalog.

Actually it's not nothing, even if the main character seems to think that it is. Even writing or sitting or thinking about something, is ... well something. So while Ben Stiller is again a quiet character who sometimes goes completely nuts (something he is very good at),this movie does have more to offer than that.

It's almost a companion piece to the "Whatever works" movie by Woody Allen. Almost and only when Stillers character gets his philosopher inside on. Or just his I hate this and that side of his character. While we do get a bit of a back-story, we never fully get him completely. But that isn't a bad thing. A human being is far more complex than to pigeon hole him/her into something.

A really quiet movie (overall),that will speak to people who like a good (personal) drama.