A veteran cast of television and film actors fills out our next Thanksgiving movie, which is actually one of the handful of films entirely centered around the holiday. Noah Wyle is the youngest son of an upper class family who's estranged from his dad but finally goes home to Maine after a three year absence (New England is a very popular setting for Thanksgiving movies). His siblings also show up, including sister Julianne Moore and brother Michael Vartan, both bringing their obnoxious significant others, and the whole clan has a sometimes fun, sometimes agonizing holiday break together, leading to various revelations and awkward interactions. The acting is really good in this one, especially from the parents, Blythe Danner and Roy Scheider as the longtime couple guarding somewhat repressed but casually unspoken secrets. This is one of those movies that alternates between amusing dialogue and heavy drama, a relic of director Bart Freundlich's indies (fun fact- he also happens to be Julianne Moore's husband). It's a pretty good and underrated film for this particular holiday, although I'll warn you it doesn't exactly have the most feelgood ending.
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