…but the adults are screwed up.

The Kids Are All Right is a decidedly small movie. It’s one of those slice-of-life films that try to emulate real life, with characters and scenarios that could easily be going on right now in any suburb, yet the characters are so well-written and superbly acted that spending time with them is a pleasure.

Annette Bening and Julianne Moore play a married lesbian couple, each with one child borne of the same anonymous sperm donor. Mia Wasikowska plays the daughter, named Joni, and Josh Hutcherson plays her (half) brother, inexplicably named Laser. The story takes place at some point between Joni’s 18th birthday and the day she moves out to college. But first, Laser — who’s still only 15 — talks her into calling the cryo clinic to get in contact with the donor who unknowingly sired them. Thus, we meet Paul, played by the ever-reliable Mark Ruffalo.

Basically put, the status quo is shaking up for everyone in this movie. Joni is starting out as a young adult and a college student. Laser is in the throes of teenage life, caught between an overbearing family and a scummy best friend. Paul is trying to fit into the lives of the kids and extended family he never knew he had. Nic is the overprotective Mama Grizzly whose perfect little life is shaken by Paul’s arrival and by Joni’s newly-independent status. And Jules… well, I think I’ll keep her little crisis to myself.

The long and short of it is that individually and in every combination, this ensemble works. It’s amazing. Bening perfectly plays a mother who doesn’t know how domineering she is, just because of how blinded she is by her love of family. Jules, meanwhile, works wonderfully as her opposite and it’s charming to see the two of them complain about leaving hair in the sink and what have you. They have their petty grievances and they sure as hell have problems, but these two women very clearly love each other. The relationship felt very authentic and unforced to me, and I’ve got more lesbian friends than any straight man should.

As for the eponymous kids, Wasikowska and Hutcherson both do wonderfully. Wasikowska in particular is much more vivid and charming here than she ever was under Tim Burton, though she’s still looking kinda pale. Hutcherson, meanwhile, makes a sympathetic teenager out of a kid who snorts coke in the first two minutes. Laser does some dumb things due to peer pressure, but he’s generally a decent kid. Together, the two are great to watch. Their sibling interplay is always very authentic and their relationship with Nic and Jules has so many little touches (referring to the pair as “Moms,” for example) that add a lot of depth.

Then we have Paul, the fifth wheel. When we first meet Paul, he’s… well, maybe “douche” is too strong a word. Still, the guy’s an egotist, he’s a horndog and he’s clearly not the smartest man alive. We never see him do any illegal substances in the movie, but I wouldn’t be at all surprised if Paul had some marijuana and/or LSD in his past. All the same, he’s not a bad person and he really does try to do right by Joni and Laser when he learns of their existence. They quite visibly change him, which does a lot to make Paul sympathetic. Major kudos to Mark Ruffalo for crafting a thoroughly likable man who’s right on the edge of being a prick without ever completely going over.

Something else that deserves mention is the screenplay and direction. The dialogue is absolutely perfect in its writing and delivery. Not only does the script make every character three-dimensional, but it also provides a ton of humor. By the nature of its story, the film is loaded with all manner of awkward situations and sexual predicaments, every one of which provides a laugh. Naturally, there are a few jokes regarding Nic and Jules’ sexuality, but it’s not necessarily “gay humor” per se. Those jokes mostly revolve around things like accidentally playing a porn tape too loud, giving Laser “the big talk,” petty griping during sex, that sort of thing. It’s very tastefully done, actually.

I have to admit, I had a lot of fun watching this movie. Sure, it wasn’t exactly a high concept or must-see cinema, but the direction was solid, the screenplay was great and the acting was amazing across the board. I was perfectly ready to give this a recommendation… until the film imploded before my eyes in its last five minutes.

First and foremost, the movie’s final treatment of Paul is spectacularly inexcusable. Yes, he screwed up pretty badly and he was rather stupid about handling it. Still, it’s plain for everyone to see that he’s apologetic and repentant about the whole thing. He literally begs forgiveness from this family, but they instead decide to shut him out entirely with little to no hope of ever reconciling. We spend the entire movie growing attached to this character and watching him develop in reaction to the core family (he’s the catalyst of the whole movie, for Christ’s sake!), and the movie kicks him to the curb like some two-bit romcom villain. What the fuck?!

Second — and perhaps even worse — is the very last sequence of the movie. I’ve been turning it over in my head and aside from a few minor details, I can’t see how it would have played any differently if the movie had never happened. There is absolutely nothing between the first scene and the last that affects how the final sequence plays out. Thus, it gives the impression that the entire movie was completely pointless. To be fair, it could be argued that the final scene shows triumph in the face of adversity — that this family will stay together in spite of all the problems they went through over the movie. The problem is that this implies that Paul was a completely negative influence on the family and that’s just something I can’t abide. I don’t know what it says about me that I’m sticking up for Paul so much, but there we are.

The Kids Are All Right is a very frustrating film for me. My enjoyment of the film in its first hundred minutes is matched only by my hatred of its final six. To that end, I will offer this unorthodox bit of advice: Go see the movie, and right after Jules is done giving her big speech to the family, leave. Walk out of the movie and make up your own ending.