Jesse Eisenberg’s directorial debut offers a captivating take on grief and inherited trauma
Jewish generational trauma is not a subject that lends itself easily to cinema. It’s complex, ambiguous, unresolved and simultaneously relevant and irrelevant to modern Jewish life. It is, in a word, painful. Painful to think about, to talk about, to confront and to ignore. Into this mess of emotions steps A Real Pain, the directorial debut from acclaimed American Jewish actor Jesse Eisenberg, who also wrote, produced and stars in the film.
David Kaplan (Eisenberg, as usual playing a version of himself) is a New York Jew who travels to Poland for a Jewish heritage tour with his cousin Benji (Kieran Culkin, heavily tipped to win awards for his performance). Their grandmother Dory, recently deceased, was a Holocaust survivor born in the country. The trip also serves to rekindle the cousins’ own relationship. They were like brothers growing up, but have drifted apart in adulthood. David is married with a young son, living in New York City and working in digital marketing. Benji is an unemployed stoner, living in his parents’ basement upstate. David is serious, buttoned-down and socially awkward, while Benji is gregarious and confident, moving through the world at his own pace.
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