‘Sam & Kate’ Could Be Called ‘Bill & Tina’

Is there a place in which nepotism can be beneficial, where the inherent ties between blood relatives enhance a process or product? The new movie “Sam & Kate” attests to the natural, if slight, benefits of “keeping it in the family” as it boasts multiple parent-progeny performances: Dustin Hoffman and his son Jake Hoffman, and Sissy Spacek and her daughter Schuyler Fisk. First-time director Darren Le Gallo also has his wife, Amy Adams, act as executive producer on the film, adding another familial element to the low-key drama/romcom.Dustin Hoffman plays Bill, an elderly widower whose health is failing and whose adult son Sam (Jake, of course) lives with him to help with everyday activities. Ms. Spacek is Tina, a single senior who’s a hoarder. Her daughter Kate (Ms. Fisk) lives nearby. As you might expect from such a set-up, the duos meet-cute (in a church parking lot), and both comforts and complications arise from their subsequent interactions.Romantic comedy staples appear repeatedly, such as when Sam first sees Kate through the window of her bookshop as he ambles by on the street, only to walk backward to look at her again. The film also features multiple dance scenes, including two in a roller rink.One’s patience for such conventions may depend on how long one can stand watching a typical Hallmark Channel movie, yet it does offer more than just romcom cliches and lite comedy; “Sam & Kate” also explores the difficulties of taking care of elderly family members and how regret and grief inhibit communication.The senior Mr. Hoffman is particularly fantastic in portraying a man filled with anger and remorse for not only having survived his wife, but ultimately living as long as he has. A secret revealed very close to the movie’s end confirms this self-loathing, and though it smacks of clumsy screenplay structuring and convenient psychology, it does ring true with everything we’ve witnessed in the character. This is not to say that the performance is all bitter old-man-ish, as there are moments of great levity and tenderness in his acting, making the harsher scenes with his son all the more incisive.Beyond her hoarding, Ms. Spacek has less to play with than her fellow titan-of-acting counterpart. Still, her couple of scenes opposite Dustin Hoffman while their characters explore a tentative romance are charming and give off real sparks. I wish I could say the same of their offspring, but Ms. Fisk and Jake Hoffman do not convince as budding lovers, with almost no chemistry between them. An awkwardness sticks to Mr. Hoffman throughout, despite his sensitive emotional countenance. In thinking about uber-talented fathers and the sons who follow them into the same field, I couldn’t help but see similarities with Bob Dylan and his musician-son Jakob.Ms. Fisk is stronger as Kate early in the film, as we can feel that there’s a story behind her resistance to dating — one we find out about later. Her scenes with her mother stand out, and the same could be said of the father and son scenes. A lived-in, deep-love quality permeates these respective pairings that no whimsical courtship could match.An undertone of financial anxiety crops up now and then in the movie. From “closeout” signs in store windows and a barren downtown (filming took place in Thomasville, Georgia) to talk of automation at the chocolate factory Sam works in, there’s a creeping sense that the country is at a crossroads. Maybe with his next picture screenwriter and director Le Gallo will lean into this uneasiness as well as he does with the meta-family element in “Sam & Kate,” creating something impactful as well as affable.

‘Sam & Kate’ Could Be Called ‘Bill & Tina’

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