Oh, Brothers.

Brothers qualifies as one of those better-than-I-expected-it-to-be's. So many ways it could have gone wrong, could have veered into the movie cliche, but it doesn't. The good brother v bad brother (cf Brotherhood, East of Eden, probably millions of books and films), the domineering military father (cf anything by Pat Conroy), falling for the brother's girlfriend/wife, returning vet can't adjust to civilization (cf Coming Home et al.), and others. Despite all these familiar tropes, Brothers makes its own way. Pretty smart script - if you can get beyond one crucial totally impossibility (how could the main character, Sam, be reported as killed in action, military funeral and all, without any body recovery? Wouldn't he have been listed as MIA - and no movie?). Acting's very good across the board, from the exceptionally cute kids to a terrific Sam Shepherd as the Vietnam vet grandad. True, Toby Maguire (as a tough Marine) and Jake Gyllenhall(sp?) as an ex-con are ludicrously miscast, but they play their big scenes really well. Makes me curious about the source, a Danish film - which I bet is even better, for a lot of reasons, more understate I bet - also, in this film, everyone watching obviously knows that Toby Maguire is not killed in the first 15 minutes; perhaps with (unknown?) Danish actors we might be surprised by that plot twist. Great, painful blowout scene near the end when Maguire tears apart the remodeled kitchen; his breakdown throughout is extremely unnerving. Film also gets props for an underplayed, ambiguous ending. Deserved more of an audience, but hey, no animated war heros, in fact no war heros at all, so what do you really expect?