Parents' Guide to Nutcrackers

It takes a while, but this family dramedy with endearing characters finds its rhythm midway through the story and builds to a fairly predictable but enormously gratifying ending. The pace of the first act of Nutcrackers feels slightly off. Scenarios meant to be funny feel overly scripted or awkwardly staged to elicit an easy laugh. There's the occasional unnecessary use of slow mo, and who paddleboards across a lake to find cell phone bars when they could easily take a car into town? Characters are set up as more locked into archetypes than they turn out to be: the big-city businessman versus the crazy homeschooled kids (played by four real-life brothers).

In act two, when they're getting to know each other, more genuine moments unfold. Details about the family's background emerge, adding complexity. The parents' experience in a cult explains the children's homeschooling (in which little to no actual schooling takes place, but at least nobody is brainwashing them). The sibling relationship between Michael and Jan comes into focus, as does Michael's lonely, work-obsessed lifestyle–no friends to even water his plant while he's away. The emotional closing sequence, deftly filmed and set to inspiring music, ties all these pieces together. Justice heartbreakingly asks, once again, "When I wake up tomorrow, are you still gonna be here?" And Michael literally awakens to his future.