The Family Stone

Filmmaker Thomas Bezucha follows up his little seen 2000 effort Big Eden with The Family Stone, a Christmas comedy about the titular family who reunite for the holidays as always but there's something different this time, eldest son Everett is bringing home his fiancée Meredith, whom they've never met before, but they are all going to hate, and the result is a funny and at times touching story of family love.

I should correct myself, because not all of them haven't met the outsider. Amy (played by Hollywood's It Girl Rachel McAdams), the youngest daughter did, and she hates her. She met her once, she tells the family before Everett and Meredith arrive, and then she goes on and on about all of Meredith's faults, and so there's no way the girl has a chance. Dermot Mulroney plays Everett and Sarah Jessica Parker, in her first released work after Sex and the City (she has a role in Strangers with Candy which was delayed to next year), plays the uptight, business driven, big talker and icy looking Meredith. When we first met her we know she's a bitch, but the minute she steps into the house we can't help but suffer for her. The way they treat her is horrendous, and there's a point when she even has to get out of there and move to the local inn to escape from then, and get her sister Julie (Claire Danes) to get there as soon as possible for support.
Two Stones so far, and there's more to go. The other big piece of the romantic part of puzzle is Everett and Amy's brother Ben (played by Luke Wilson), the easy going and free spirit member of the family. The other siblings are Susannah (Elizabeth Reaser) who has a young daughter and is currently pregnant, and Thad (Ty Giordano) who is deaf and gay, and has a partner in Patrick (Brian White), who happens to be African-American. And finally the parents, who headline the serious part of the movie, Sybil (Diane Keaton) and Kelly (Craig T. Nelson), and they are keeping a secret from most of their kids.

There will be drama and comedy, laughing and crying, loving and hating, but at the end the will be happy together because after all, this is a family movie and set on Christmas, so you can't complain about that. Still, the movie works because of the very strong acting, led by Sarah Jessica Parker who gives a great performance and could get a supporting nod (if they go for that) at the Oscars, once everyone realizes that the one we all thought was going to steal the movie didn't. And that is Diane Keaton, who is pretty good too, but though it seemed like this was an Oscar grabber role for her, the part is surprisingly small and in the background of the others. Manipulative with our emotions, even. Luke Wilson and Rachel McAdams play their characters really great too.
With so many characters to work on (McAdams' Amy even gets a second subplot as All the Real Girls' Paul Schneider shows up late in the movie as a former boyfriend), Bezucha is not able to really develop them as they should, and so some of them, even the big names, get just really great scenes but overall you can tell there's something missing for the story to completely work. I do thank Bezucha though, for not getting all melodramatic towards the end when you can tell that is going to be a cry fest, but he does it in a different way and it works very well. Thanks to very good acting and a couple of great scenes, The Family Stone is not a great movie but is good enough, and definitely worth watching.