Jesse Eisenberg first came on my radar as the insecure teen taken under the wing of his smooth-talking uncle in the 2002 movie, Roger Dodger, his first film. I instantly looked for his name as soon as the credits rolled because I knew, right then, that he was an actor I wanted to see more of.
He’s gone on to a stellar career playing mostly cerebral, nerdy guys who are the backbone of much interesting storytelling, especially in our tech-obsessed age. It’s no accident that his highest profile role, for which he received an Oscar nomination, was as Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg in The Social Network.
In recent years, Eisenberg has branched out into writing and directing and A Real Pain – which opens in theaters in Israel next week and which will be shown at the Haifa International Film Festival several times, starting on January 4 – his second feature as writer/director, succeeds on every level.
The film tells a particularly Jewish-American story that nevertheless has connected with mainstream audiences around the world, and it’s a triumph for him as an actor as well as a director/screenwriter. The movie, which won a screenwriting award at the Sundance Flim Festival, is nominated for four Golden Globes and is expected to receive many Oscar nominations.
A Real Pain tells the story of two cousins, grieving the recent loss of their grandmother, who take a tour of Jewish sites in Poland, where she was from, to honor her memory. Eisenberg plays David, a tightly wound young man who has a wife and child he loves and a job he’s good at and that pays his bills, even if he isn’t passionate about it.
But he also suffers from serious social anxiety and has an obsessive-compulsive disorder that is bad enough he needs to take medication for it. His cousin Benji (Kieran Culkin), who was especially close to their grandmother, has had a difficult time in his adult life, and things have become worse for him following her death.
Culkin gives an extraordinary performance as Benji, one of those phenomenally charming people who has never learned – and will never learn – not to say exactly what’s on his mind.
He’s passionate and open in a way that is endearing and captivating in short doses but can grate in the long run, especially if you have to clean up his messes. There will never be a steady relationship or job for someone with Benji’s commitment to truth-telling, but you can have great conversations with him.
The two, who haven’t spent that much time together in recent years, come together for the trip to Poland, where they join a tour guided by an appealing, non-Jewish British academic, James (Will Sharpe from The White Lotus), who is fascinated by Jewish history.
The tour group features an interesting cross-section of travelers, including Eloge (Kurt Egyiawan), a Jewish convert who survived the Rwandan genocide; Marcia (Jennifer Grey of Dirty Dancing), a divorcee trying to get her life back on track; and Liza Sadovy and Daniel Oreskes, a married couple.
Everyone is instantly intrigued with Benji and they all open up to him, while it’s harder for David to get to know them. When Benji criticizes the extremely sensitive and accommodating James for not including more encounters with Polish locals in their itinerary, David is mortified, but James takes it to heart.
As they travel, David is a bit miffed that while he thought the tour would be a bonding experience for him and his cousin, Benji spends his time bonding with the rest of the group.
Eventually, Benji and David do draw close, as seeing the remnants of Jewish life in Poland begins to break down the barriers they have erected between them over the years. They move closer to that place in childhood – before factors such as careers and marriage changed the dynamics – when they were just two kids. At moments, the years melt away and you get the sense that David is opening up in a way that he hasn’t to anyone in years.
Standout moments
THE WRITING is extraordinary, and each scene moves along filled with insights into the characters and interesting ideas. Much of it is funny as well, as the fish-out-of-water trope of two Jewish Americans in Poland blends with their own cousinly conflict.
In a standout moment, Benji tries to avoid paying for tickets on a train, saying Jews in Poland shouldn’t have to pay because, “This is our country,” to which David responds, “No, it’s not. It was our country. They kicked us out ’cause they thought we were cheap.”
In another exchange, David chides Benji for being too openly emotional, to which Benji says, “Dave, we’re on a f***in’ Holocaust tour. If now isn’t the time and place to grieve, to open up, then I don’t know what to tell you, man.”
As the film progresses, Eisenberg plays with our expectations in the best way, and the scenes that you expect will end with an outpouring of emotion are mostly anti-climactic, while throwaway moments may make you tear up.
The film masterfully shows how Holocaust trauma has filtered down through the generations but also shows that this trauma cannot be neatly categorized or overcome because it is so pervasive. It also suggests that their Jewish identity helps them by giving them a vantage point from which to observe the world.
By the end of this moving film, which seems to come too quickly – as opposed to most movies, which I often wish were shorter – you will feel as if you know Benji and David, and you may identify with one or both of them. Certainly, you will feel glad that they took you along on this trip.
An interview with Jesse Eisenberg will appear in tomorrow’s Jerusalem Post.