Men, Women & Children (film)

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Men, Women & Children
Men Women & Children poster.jpg
Theatrical release poster
Directed byJason Reitman
Screenplay byJason Reitman
Erin Cressida Wilson
Based onMen, Women & Children
by Chad Kultgen
Produced byJason Reitman
Helen Estabrook
StarringRosemarie DeWitt
Jennifer Garner
Judy Greer
Dean Norris
Adam Sandler
CinematographyEric Steelberg
Edited byDana E. Glauberman
Music byStephen Wilkinson
Production
company
Distributed byParamount Pictures
Release dates
  • September 6, 2014 (2014-09-06) (TIFF)
  • October 1, 2014 (2014-10-01) (United States)
Running time
119 minutes[1]
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
Budget$16 million
Box office$2.2 million[2]

Men, Women & Children is a 2014 American comedy-drama film directed by Jason Reitman and co-written with Erin Cressida Wilson, based on a novel of the same name written by Chad Kultgen that deals with online addiction. The film stars Rosemarie DeWitt, Jennifer Garner, Judy Greer, Dean Norris, Adam Sandler, Ansel Elgort, Kaitlyn Dever and Timothée Chalamet.

The film premiered at the 2014 Toronto International Film Festival on September 6, 2014.[3] The film was released on October 1, 2014, by Paramount Pictures.[4]

Plot[]

Donald and Helen Truby are a sexually unsatisfied married couple. Helen has multiple affairs on the social media website Ashley Madison, and Donald regularly visits escorts. Donald accidentally catches his wife's affair, and in a discussion the day after this discovery, both confess to their scandalous activities and agree to ignore they ever happened. Their teenage son Chris is aroused by material not deemed "normal" by society. Chris, in order to condition himself to have arousal towards "traditional means", dates classmate Hannah, who models for a website run by her mom Joan. However, as they start to initiate sex, Chris fails to become aroused and they break up. Hannah auditions for a television series to become famous, but Joan takes the website down after her daughter's activity on the site disqualified her for the show.

Tim, a former football player who quits to play a MMORPG following his parents' divorce, gains a more positive view of the point of life after dating the introverted Brandy Beltmeyer, who expresses herself on a secret Tumblr account. The account and Tim's online conversations are discovered by her overprotective mother Patricia, who confiscates her daughter's online privileges. Tim's father Kent, noticing lewd comments about a Facebook picture of his mother on Tim's game, confronts Tim and states she abandoned both of them. He deletes the game and demands Tim play football next year, causing Tim to have a breakdown. Patricia then poses as Brandy and messages to Tim that she is uninterested in him. However, this makes Tim overdose on his antidepressants and nearly die, which makes Patricia deactivate the surveillance device she used to monitor Brandy.

Joan goes to content awareness meetings to learn about what is legally allowed on her daughter's website, where she starts a relationship with Kent Mooney, a divorced man who has been distant from his son and high school student Tim since the separation. After Joan informs him about the website, he initially wants to end the relationship. However, after reconciling with Tim and realizing how hard being a single parent is, Kent reconnects with Joan.

Hannah's friend Allison Doss starts a relationship with Brandon Lender, and he treats it casually and with disinterest. The two have sex, which causes Allison to have an ectopic pregnancy. Although her parents learn about it, Brandon is now only concerned about others discovering they had sex. After realizing how selfish he is, she throws a rock through his window in the middle of the night.

Cast[]

Production[]

By September 4, 2013, Jason Reitman had cast Adam Sandler, Rosemarie DeWitt and Jennifer Garner in the lead roles.[6] By December 16, Emma Thompson, Judy Greer and Dean Norris were cast.[5] The young cast includes Ansel Elgort, Kaitlyn Dever, Elena Kampouris, Travis Tope, Katherine Hughes, Olivia Crocicchia, and Timothée Chalamet.[7] Other stars are David Denman, Jason Douglas, Dennis Haysbert, Shane Lynch, and J. K. Simmons.[8] Will Peltz also joined the cast, on December 17.[9] Principal photography began on December 16, 2013, in and around Austin, Texas.[7][8]

Reception[]

Box office[]

Men, Women & Children premiered at the 2014 Toronto International Film Festival on September 6, 2014.[10] The film opened in limited release on October 1, 2014 in 17 theaters and grossed $48,024 with an average of $2,825 per theater and ranking #48 at the box office. In its wide release on October 17 in 608 theaters the film grossed $306,367 with an average of $504 per theater and ranking #23, making it the fifth lowest opening in a release of 600 theaters or more.[11] The film ultimately earned $705,908 in the United States and $1,534,627 internationally for a total of $2,240,535 worldwide, well below its $16 million production budget.[2]

Critical response[]

The film received a "rotten" score of 33% on Rotten Tomatoes based on 139 reviews with an average rating of 4.90/10. The critical consensus states: "Men, Women & Children is timely, but director Jason Reitman's overbearing approach to its themes blunts the movie's impact."[12] The film also has a score of 38 out of 100 on Metacritic based on 36 critics, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews".[13] Film critic Robbie Collin felt Men, Women & Children "played like a spoof" with others agreeing the film was "mawkish and clichéd".[14]

References[]

  1. ^ "Men, Women & Children (15)". British Board of Film Classification. September 19, 2014. Retrieved September 19, 2014.
  2. ^ a b "Men, Women & Children (2014)". Box Office Mojo. Retrieved February 25, 2015.
  3. ^ "Toronto Film Festival Lineup". Variety. Retrieved July 22, 2014.
  4. ^ Lee, Ashley (September 18, 2014). "Jennifer Garner Is Way Too Paranoid of Social Media in 'Men, Women & Children' Trailer". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved September 26, 2014.
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h Ford, Rebecca (December 16, 2013). "Jason Reitman's 'Men, Women & Children' Adds Emma Thompson, Judy Greer, Dean Norris". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved December 19, 2013.
  6. ^ "Toronto: Jason Reitman Lining Up His Next Film". The Hollywood Reporter. September 4, 2013. Retrieved December 19, 2013.
  7. ^ a b Billington, Alex (December 16, 2013). "Jason Reitman's Next Film 'Men, Women & Children' Begins Shooting". FirstShowing.net. Retrieved December 19, 2013.
  8. ^ a b "Production Begins on Jason Reitman's Men, Women & Children" (Press release). Paramount Pictures via ComingSoon.net. December 16, 2013. Retrieved December 19, 2013.
  9. ^ Kroll, Justin (December 17, 2013). "Will Peltz Joins Cast of Jason Reitman's 'Men, Women & Children'". Variety. Retrieved December 19, 2013.
  10. ^ "Early Buzz: Jason Reitman's Men, Women & Children [TIFF 2014] - /Film". Slashfilm. Retrieved November 30, 2014.
  11. ^ "Jason Reitman's 'Men, Women and Children' Takes Box-Office Bellyflop - TheWrap". TheWrap. Retrieved November 30, 2014.
  12. ^ "Men, Women & Children". Rotten Tomatoes (Fandango). Retrieved January 28, 2022.
  13. ^ "Men, Women & Children". Metacritic (CBS Interactive). Retrieved October 17, 2014.
  14. ^ Collin, Robbie (December 5, 2014). "Men, Women & Children, review: 'plays like a spoof'". The Daily Telegraph. London. Retrieved December 29, 2014.

External links[]

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