Adult Beginners (2015) - Ross Katz

Jake, a young and narcissistic entrepreneur, finds his whole company go belly-up financially the night before the launch of his newest product.  Losing not only his money, but the money of many of his friends and acquaintances that invested, Jake leaves Manhattan and moves in with his sister, Justine, a pregnant woman who Jake hasn't spoken with in months, possibly years.  Justine and Bobby, her husband, agree to let Jake stay with them for several months, but he has to help out around the house, which leads to Jake becoming their nanny.  Ross Katz's Adult Beginners is a film the relies heavily on Nick Kroll's lovable shtick to keep things interesting, somehow managing to somewhat elevate the film above completely forgettable generic indie fare.  Adult Beginners is exploding with typical tropes of the genre, being primarily a story about a man who has to face responsibility and grow up.  Typical of many films of this ilk, Adult Beginners bounces along with little conflict real conflict until Jake discovers that Bobby is cheating on Justine with another woman.  This of course opens up the floodgates, leading to underlying tension centered around the death of Jake and Justine's mother boiling over in their current relationship, with Justine furious at Jake for never being capable of confronting life's problems.  Adult Beginners is somewhat funny but also infuriating at times due to its mild approach to complicated issues, being a film that would have been completely dead on arrival if not for Kroll's work as the narcissistic Jake.

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