Enough Said (Julia Louis-Dreyfus, James Gandolfini, Toni Collette, Catherine Keener) — Rush out … No, RUN … to see this fabulous small film. With the best comedy dialogue I have heard in years, Enough Said is a joy to watch. With expert acting from the versatile, award-winning Saturday Night Live/Seinfeld/Veep alum Julia Louis-Dreyfus and award-winning Sopranos star James Gandolfini (in one of his last performances before his untimely death), this independent film is a lesson in relationships, love, fear, hope and empty nesting.
Our main characters meet at a party in a very casual way, expressing no interest in each other but creating an unmistakable spark. Both are divorced with daughters about to leave home to go to college. Eva is a masseuse; Albert runs a museum about old TV shows. They are just plain working people living ordinary lives in California, trying to deal with existing and future greater loneliness. They are convinced they’ll never meet someone else. At the rate they are going, they may not. Then, they meet each other. Perfect. Happy ending is on the way.
Not so fast. First, there are the daughters. Hers is anxious to head off on her own to Sarah Lawrence. His is a tart-talking free spirit with no filters. Both girls very clearly love their parents but feel a bit smothered. They aren’t any different than most high school seniors, full of themselves, their friends, and ideas about sex, love, and videotapes (okay, I made that last one up to see if you were still awake!).
Even little movies need more than this plot to work. So we add a strong supporting cast with the always-superb Catherine Keener as Marianne, a published poet, who becomes a massage client and ends up her friend. Award winner Toni Collette plays Sarah, Eva friend and confessor. She is a psychologist with a normal husband but a problem maid, who she just can’t bring herself around to fire.
Since all plots like this need either tumult or misunderstanding between main characters, we get both. Albert is a bit of a slob, and he isn’t exactly svelte. His ex-wife left him for those reasons. Eva is less flawed but has withdrawn from relationships and views herself as a schlep (that’ll send some of you to your Yiddish dictionary).
I won’t tell you if the ending is happy. I will tell you that the journey is worth every minute of this only hour-and-a-half film. It is a tribute to what good writing and acting can do.