Holiday Movie Preview 2004

In Good Company

It's a recipe for a massive midlife crisis: A 51-year-old middle manager (Dennis Quaid) is edged out of his job by a 26-year-old (Topher Grace) after a corporate merger, but he has to swallow his pride because he's got college tuition to worry about for his two teenage daughters, and now he's got a new baby on the way as well. Then the hyperactive wunderkind tries to get the old guy with corporate synergy by merging assets with his oldest daughter (Scarlett Johansson).

If director Paul Weitz (American Pie) were going the traditional route, he would have put out the casting call to Steve Martin and started working on pratfall jokes. But this is no standard old-guy-gets-it story. Stalwart, dapper Quaid lends an air of Job-like patience to his character. He loves his family and has no questions about his self-worth. So what can anyone do to him? It's up to everyone else to fall apart.

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