This film is up for 83rd Academy Awards:
- Best Picture
- Best Actress (Annette Bening)
- Best Supporting Actor (Mark Ruffalo)
- Best Writing - Original Screenplay (Lisa Cholodenko and Stuart Blumberg)
It seems the screenplay PDF link Focus Features provided has been discontinued.

Lisa Cholodenko is also the director.



Budget     $4 million
Gross revenue     $29 million

Rotten Tomatoes reports that 94% of critics have given the film a positive review

This dramedy follows a couple handling infidelity. (sigh.)
Near-adult children of lesbian couple locate their sperm donor father, his introduction to the family leads to romantic complications. Well... is more base desire than romance, but... complications ensue, none the less.

I didn't see what was so outstanding about it, but it's par for Academy award nomination material: Dysfunction IS entertainment, after all.    

Ironically, Julianne Moore is more the lead than Bening, but it's the latter that's getting the nomination.
Whatever.

What I find myself becoming increasingly sensitive to and appreciative of are films that carry great interest without involving monster budgets, huge special effects sequences, pervasive gun play and DEATH DEATH DEATH!!! as a central motivating theme.

I'm growing fond of these low budget + high quality films.

This and WINTER'S BONE have really caught my attention for such.

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On with DVD extra features... ! As regarding screen writing, of course.

Director is also co-writer started writing this in late 2004. With a couple of features under her belt and a co-writer she thought she'd bang this screenplay out pretty quick.
Five years and her own sperm donor pregnancy & delivery later she was shooting.

Julianne Moore attached early through prior friendship, subsequently the character of "Jules" was largely re-written for her.

After Annette Bening was cast scenes were re-written to accommodate her personality.

Just as a general perspective sort of thing.
$4M budget / 23 shooting days = $173,000 per shooting day or $37,000 per screen minute.
Comp to DAYBREAKERS with a $500k/day shooting budget or $204K/ screen minute.
or GREEN ZONE @ $869K/screen minute.

Interesting. At least to me!

Writer/Director expresses frustration with MPAA over demand to cut-down (not cut-out) teens breifly watching gay porn scene - even though - as approved she acknowledges it effectively communicates the purpose of the scene.
In other words, there's what you want and what you need.

My first tip off that this entire production was very flying-by-the-seat-of-their-pants was that Josh Hutchenson didn't know this was supposed to be a comedy. He admitted afterwards to the director he played his part as straight drama, to which she was surprised and was amused.
Then the director makes quite a few more remarks about how they didn't have time for this or that. She had only met Mark Ruffalo in his trailer the morning of his first day on the set when she handed him his lines.
AGH!
Wardrobes were completely off her input. Moore often wore tee-shirts from the director's personal wardrobe from home.
Even Moore's faux tattoo was a subject of director's resignation. (Stallone, as director, did the same with Mickey Rourke's choice of tattoos in THE EXPENDABLES. Just... trust the actor. Let go.)
Seems there was a lot of that sort of stuff going on.
It doesn't sound like there were ever any script rehearsals.
By her own admission, Cholodenko stated this really was a running and gunning movie.
And Ruffalo had very nice things to say about her directorial style.
I frequently see great appreciation by actors for a loose style of direction.

I'm impressed.

Even after five years of two writers working on the script there are scenes shot by the writer/director that were STILL edited for excessive dialog and even story directional content.