Directed by Jesse Eisenberg — Screenplay by Jesse Eisenberg.
Jesse Eisenberg’s A Real Pain follows Jewish American cousins David (played by Jesse Eisenberg) and Benji (played by Kieran Culkin) as they travel from New York City to Poland for the purpose of taking part in a Holocaust tour group, as well as to visit the childhood home of their late grandmother in an attempt to establish a deeper connection to their heritage. On the trip, their rapport is put to the test, as David, a family father, is much more introverted and reserved, while Benji, a drifter with very little going on in his life, is extremely outgoing and extroverted to the degree that David isn’t comfortable with.
With this, his sophomore feature as a director, Eisenberg, the veteran actor now in his forties, is proving himself to be quite a skilled triple-threat. He is competent behind-the-camera, delivers strong work in front of it, and, as if that wasn’t enough, A Real Pain is also extremely well-written — in fact, the writing may actually be the best thing about it. The film’s title is, of course, a play on its multiple meanings, e.g. both someone being ‘a real pain’ (i.e. being annoying or exasperating) and the complicated emotions they’re feeling (such as grief, depression, anxiety etc.). But there’s a lot more to it. Eisenberg’s characterizations smartly capture extro- and introversion in a way that feels very authentic, while, at the same time, crafting a narrative that both intelligently gets to the heart of feelings concerning the pain of the central characters’ mismatch and struggle to fully understand each other, the pain that they (and the other people on the tour) are working and suffering through, generational privilege guilt, and the heartache that you may never truly understand the horrors of history that family members lived through.
With regards to generational privilege guilt, the film is partially concerned with putting into perspective modern, first-world, problems and ‘pains’ and juxtaposing them with what their grandparent went through, which suddenly feels real in certain places in Poland. At the same time, modern problems aren’t judged to be insignificant. It is an intelligently made script that always feels authentic, as Eisenberg, wisely, doesn’t feel the need to shoehorn in Hollywoodized elements for dramatic effect, which may have tarnished the overall impression.
Although the writing is arguably the strongest element of the film, the one standout element that has received the most public recognition is arguably the performance delivered by Kieran Culkin. It is understandable because Culkin is predictably sensationally entertaining and phenomenally chaotic, as he does best — and did wonderfully on Succession — but with a vulnerable gooey center beneath a directness that is sometimes quite stressful to watch. In the shared dynamic of his and Eisenberg’s character, the film really shines, as their odd-couple pairing feels authentic and, to be clear, isn’t just something played for cheap laughs like it might’ve been in the hands of another filmmaker. It is a wonderful, smartly written, and sensitive but also funny two-hander that gets the most out of its central stars’ unique gifts, including the acting talents of its triple-threat filmmaker, whose star is now also on the rise behind-the-camera.
8 out of 10
– Review Written by Jeffrey Rex Bertelsen.
I'm Jeffrey Rex 