Noah Baumbach’s sparkling comedy is about the desire of every generation to usurp the position of another. Josh (Ben Stiller) and Cornelia (Naomi Watts) are a childless couple whose friends are all boarding the baby train. Josh is a onceacclaimed documentarian whose current project is a dauntingly impenetrable think-piece. Into their lives bounce another couple: a pair of young hipsters played by Adam Driver and Amanda Seyfried. Driver’s Jamie, himself an aspiring filmmaker, claims to be a fan of Josh’s work.

Josh and Cornelia find themselves turning down the usual baby-centred invites to hang out with their new BFFs. When Josh and Jamie start sabotaging their respective projects, Baumbach resurrects the rivalry between Woody Allen and Alan Alda in Crimes and Misdemeanors, adding the intergenerational twist that gives his film such a giddy freshness.

Baumbach (Frances Ha) packs his film with the wit and vigour of a one-act play. This is intellectually supercharged entertainment, with a laugh-lineper-minute count it would be grouchy to undersell.

Tim Robey
The Daily Telegraph

 

Please note that the festival is over 18s only