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I recently watched a small film festival darling from last year that received some fair buzz: Jeff, Who Lives at Home. It's a comedy (with dramatic elements) starring Jason Segel and Ed Helms as brothers. The former is adrift at age 30, who seeks inspiration in looking for "signs" in the random occurrences around him. The latter is an embittered husband whose marriage (to a character played by Judy Greer) is falling apart. They both get caught up in an adventure together on the same day their mother (Susan Sarandon) has some spice thrown into her dull office job by a secret admirer who instant messages her.

The script, written and directed by Jay and Mark Duplass, walks an interesting line of being simple without being simplistic. There are some clever ideas interwoven here, but not too tightly. The movie strikes a pleasant tone, dealing with some very strong emotions and subjects without presuming to offer anything truly profound as commentary. Instead, the film just presents some intriguingly realistic characters, and invites us to tag along with them for a particularly momentous day of change in their lives.

The movie probably could have gone either way, but the superb cast is definitely what makes it fall the right way. Anyone who has watched How I Met Your Mother regularly will be aware that while Jason Segel is of course very funny, he also is gifted at more serious, dramatic moments. He gets to show both of those skills in this movie as the sentimental spine of the piece. Ed Helms has made a personal industry of playing an anger-possessed character who is nonetheless sympathetic, and does it well again here.

Susan Sarandon plays the most serious storyline of the film, really making you feel the plight of a woman who has convinced herself she's become too old for love. Judy Greer is phenomenal in several tense scenes with Helms.

I loved the way the movie all tied together, but hung a lantern on the entire concept to deflate the pretentiousness from it. It made it possible for the movie to be funny, first and foremost. And it was that. I was ultimately quite surprised by how much I enjoyed this short and simple little film. I grade it an A-, and give it a strong recommendation.