I Smile Back

A suburban mother (Sarah Silverman) struggles with substance abuse in director Adam Salky's downbeat adaptation of co-writer Amy Koppelman's titular 2008 novel. Laney (Silverman) lives with her insurance salesman husband Bruce (Josh Charles) in upstate New York. When Laney stops taking lithium, she drowns her feelings of low self-worth in alcohol, cocaine, and an affair with her best friend Sue's restaurateur husband, Donny (Thomas Sadoski), who claims that he's preparing to leave his wife, although Laney doesn't believe him—nor does she seem to care. After a night of indulgence in which Laney engages in strange antics while her family is asleep, she decides she needs help, and checks into a rehab facility where she takes her meds and talks to a therapist (Terry Kinney) about the father (Chris Sarandon) who abandoned her. After returning home, Laney longs to drink, feels awkward around Donny, and notices that her sensitive son, Eli (Skylar Gaertner), has developed a twitch. She tries to get back into the swing of things, but the more she struggles, the more her husband pulls away. Although Silverman has appeared in dramas before, including Sarah Polley's Take This Waltz, this is her first dramatic leading role. But as good as she is, the film still feels like a rough draft, largely because Laney has no hobbies or ambitions, making her too much of a blank slate. Still, this should be considered a strong optional purchase. (K. Fennessy)