Cyrus

Directed by Jay Duplass and Mark Duplass

(R)

***

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Cyrus is the summer’s “most original and crazily inventive comedy,” said Peter Travers in Rolling Stone. Brothers Jay and Mark Duplass, who wrote and directed the film, have graduated to the big leagues with this “potently funny and painfully real” comedy of discomfort. John (John C. Reilly) is a genially hapless divorcé. He finally meets the right woman (Marisa Tomei), but there’s an obstacle: Cyrus (Jonah Hill), her 21-year-old son with a creepy and inconvenient mother fixation. What plays out between the two men “amuses and unnerves in equal measure,” said Kenneth Turan in the Los Angeles Times. As the good-natured John tries to get closer, two-faced Cyrus pulls more than a few tricks meant to scare him away. All three actors seem to “understand where the warmth, the laughs, and the conflicts lie” when trying to fit into the life of someone new. The film could have gone for easy laughs, but doesn’t, said Owen Gleiberman in Entertainment Weekly. Instead, the Duplasses masterfully mix rhythm, tone, and fascinating psychological insight to create a grown-up comedy that’s “more realistic” than most.