The Dinner
starring Richard Gere, Laura Linney, Steve Coogan and Rebecca Hall
screenplay by Oren Moveman
directed by Oren Moveman
Rating: ♦◊◊◊◊
Based on the Dutch novel The Dinner by Herman Koch, I chose The Dinner over the other current fare in the DVD shop featuring dinosaurs, aliens, spies, hit men, talking animals or comic book superheroes because I was looking for a human drama, not some mental junk. I think I got more than I bargained for. It’s a dramatic story all right - almost too difficult to watch sometimes. It was difficult to watch, but I respect the acting and directing to tell a complicated family story.
History teacher Paul Lohman and his wife Claire along with his politician brother Stan and his wife Katelyn meet up for an organized dinner that Stan booked for the four of them. The reason is to discuss an incident in which their children verbally and physically harassed a homeless woman at an ATM leading to her death when one of them threw a lit match that set her sleeping bag on fire, killing her. It takes a while to figure out what the story is. It twists and turns and features flashbacks to the incident. The first thing is to figure out the timeline, the sequence of events in order to explain the purpose of the siblings’ dinner.
Over the course of the night, tensions run amok among the dysfunctional group intercut with more flashbacks that view the troubled family’s past. The arguments grow more tense as they clash on whether the boys should take the blame or to simply cover up their wrongdoing. They have the wealth and social position to cover it up. Stan is on the verge of running for State Governor plus he’s completely absorbed with negotiating support in the state legislature for a health bill he is sponsoring. The predicament of his children pushes him this way and that. Of the entire group he mostly clearly sees and tries to pursue the moral path: the teenagers have to confess and go to prison.
Finally, there is no resolution. It appears that Paul is going to murder his nephew for trying to implicate his own son. He’s interrupted in that endeavor by the arrival of his brother. But then Stan gets distracted by a telephone call informing him that he has the votes for his health bill. And that’s where the story ends.
The film corrodes my regard for the mentally ill. Paul, played by Steve Coogan, is a real piece of shit human being who wears out the long-suffering indulgence of his family.
After watching The Dinner I was be glad to watch a dinosaur, or a superhero, or a talking animal movie just to relax.