"The Way Way Back" follows 14-year-old Duncan's (James) summer vacation with his mother, Pam (Collette), her overbearing boyfriend, Trent (Carell), and his daughter, Steph (Zoe Levin). The filmmakers eventually "settled on" Rash to play the role of Louis, but despite that managed to snag an impressive cast that includes Steve Carell, Toni Collette, Allison Janney, AnnaSophia Robb, Sam Rockwell, Maya Rudolph, Liam James, Amanda Peet and Rob Corddry. As you can see in this newly released video from the casting process, things didn't go so well for Chicago native Danny Pudi, Joel McHale, Gillian Jacobs and Yvette Nicole Brown or "Saturday Night Live" cast member Will Forte.
Aside from its funny moments, the pic sends a good message on how detrimental to the health of youngsters can be the onslaught of psychological bullying at home if left unchecked.With their costar both co-writing and co-directing a film, cast members of "Community" probably expected to have a leg up on the competition when they auditioned for a role in "The Way Way Back," the new comedy from Oscar winners Jim Rash, who plays Dean Pelton on the NBC sitcom, and Nat Faxon. Carell as the pic’s dick and Collette as the sympathetic single-mom trying to rebound after a heart-breaking divorce, turn in superb performances that shows at times a good cast can even overcome its stale material. But overall the comedy was sharp and effective. Some comedy set-pieces fall flat, like the ones with the white boy trying to dance like a black man. Though its sitcom material is over-familiar, the excellent performances and the likeability factors of Liam and Rockwell teaming up to mesh so well together, keep it entertaining without going for too much slickness. Given a chance to blossom at the park under the gentle and amusing mentoring of Owen, Duncan smiles for the first time and meets the other decent park employees that include the dutiful Caitlin (Maya Rudolph), a love interest of Owen, the cheerful swim slide operator Roddy ( Nat Faxon ) and the droll humored effete equipment booth operator Lewis ( Jim Rash ).
To get away from the phony gaiety of the summer vacationers that he can’t share in and some of the adult hanky-panky, Duncan secretly bikes off to Water Wizz, the local amusement park, where he’s befriended by the outrageous rebellious park manager Owen ( Sam Rockwell ) and gets a daytime summer gig without letting his family know. When Susanna realizes the socially awkward Duncan is just as miserable there as she is, she makes contact with him in measured conversations and Duncan develops a summer crush on the older girl. Trent has a ready-made cast of beach house friends that include Betty ( Allison Janney), the overfriendly, loudmouth, boozy, oversexed divorced neighbor and her unhappy high school aged daughter Susanna ( AnnaSophia Robb) and her nerdy rejected young eye-patch wearing son Peter ( River Alexander ). They will be staying at Trent’s sea-side summer cottage, Riptide. The tone of the pic is set when Trent asks Duncan during the car ride to rate himself from a scale 1 to 10, and when the kid reluctantly answers 6 Trent chimes in that the correct answer should be 3. Unhappy, moping, shy adolescent Duncan (Liam James, Canadian) sits in the reverse-facing seat in the back of mom’s boyfriend’s station wagon (how the film got its awkward title), as he goes on a forced summer vacation with his divorced harried caterer mom Pam (Toni Collette), her insensitive asshole bossy divorced boyfriend Trent ( Steve Carell ) and his sourpuss boy crazy daughter Steph (Zoe Levin). The character-laden pic seamlessly blends together comedy with serious dramatic life lessons, and is observant, poignant and with its heart in the right place. The coming-of-age comedy/drama is seen through the eyes of the rejected nerdy 14-year-old Duncan ( Liam James ). The directing debut of Oscar-winning writers for The Descendants, Nat Faxon & Jim Rash, is successful. “ The character-laden pic seamlessly blends together comedy with dramatic serious life lessons, and is observant, poignant and its heart is in the right place. Riegel music: Rob Simonsen cast: Steve Carell (Trent), Toni Collette (Pam), Allison Janney (Betty), AnnaSophia Robb (Susanna), Sam Rockwell (Owen), Maya Rudolph (Caitlin), Liam James (Duncan), Rob Corddry (Kip), Amanda Peet (Joan), Zoe Levin ( Steph), Jim Rash (Lewis), Nat Faxon ( Roddy), Maya Rudolph (Caitlin), River Alexander (Peter) Runtime: 103 MPAA Rating: PG-13 producers: Kevin J. (director/writer: Nat Faxon & Jim Rash cinematographer: John Bailey editor: Tatiana S.
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