"Godless, Humanist Psychobabble"

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What You Need To Know:
A REAL PAIN is well acted. However, it has a strong humanist, godless worldview with abundant foul language. As Jews, neither Benji nor David are religious. Also, Benji sometimes spouts some politically correct, communist virtue signaling against rich people and against “corporate” neglect of the poor. Also, A REAL PAIN never gets beyond the somewhat shallow, godless psychobabble in its script. This character study never really gets to any moral or spiritual heart inside the two cousins, despite the love they sometimes show for none another.
Content:
More Detail:
A REAL PAIN is a well-acted character study about two thirtysomething Jewish cousins from New York who are traveling on a Holocaust tour in Poland. Before the tour’s last day, they plan to visit their late grandmother’s old house before she came to America after surviving the Holocaust.
One cousin, Benji, seems to have no job, but he’s got lots of nervous energy. He also has wild mood swings where he’s up and then depressed, then suddenly rude. Sometimes, Benji forgets his rude behavior later, but sometimes he remembers it and apologizes. Despite all that, at one point, Benji’s cousin, David, a family man with a boring job, describes Benji as having lots of “charm” that’s attractive to other people. However, in the movie, Benji comes across more as overly friendly and talkative but playful. Thus, he seems more annoying than charming, although sometimes he can be insightful. For example, in one scene, he gives the British tour guide some good advice, although he’s slightly annoying when he does it.
The two cousins clearly love one another despite the tension in their relationship that sometimes occurs, Also, they are not religious, especially David, the more reserved and straight-laced one. However, other people on the tour are religious Jews, including a black convert from Rwanda.
As these character relationships play out, the British tour guide takes them to the old Jewish quarter of Lublin and to a German death camp right outside the city. Eventually, when Benji storms out during a dinner, David reveals to the group he’s still upset and concerned because of a suicide attempt Benji pulled six months ago.
A REAL PAIN is well acted. Kieran Culkin, who plays Benji, has received much acclaim for his performance. However, the movie also has lots of strong gratuitous foul language, which takes away from Culkin’s performance and that of Writer/Director Jesse Eisenberg, who plays David. The foul language fits right in with the movie’s godless humanist worldview. Though the other people on the tour group are religious Jews, the movie itself adopts the secular humanist worldview of the two cousins. As such, A REAL PAIN appears to promote a brand of vague, godless psychobabble that never gets to the moral, spiritual nature or heart inside the two cousins. So, the movie just ends, with no real resolution, which is often the case with open-ended humanist art movies like A REAL PAIN.
Also, the nervous cousin, Benji, sometimes expresses empty, politically correct, communist, anti-capitalist sentiments against “rich people.” For example, while riding in the first-class compartment of a train, he angrily complains that they’re even riding first class because of what happened to Jews in Poland during the Holocaust. Jews were forced into train boxcars traveling to the death camps. Benji adds that rich people crate such things as first-class compartents to satisfy their own selfish “corporate travel” needs, with no care for the needs of “the poor.” Later, Benji complains, “Rich people are idiots” and “Money is like heroin for boring people.” This kind of shallow, communist virtue signaling fits right in with the godless, humanist psychobabble in A REAL PAIN. Benji’s cousin, David, recognizes that Benji’s spouting Marxist ideology, but, otherwise, the movie ignores David’s point and never develops it any further.