It looks so good doesn't it? A quirky sarcastic movie starring Dennis Quaid, Ellen Page, Thomas Hayden Church, and Sarah Jessica Parker? Well the important thing to take away from Smart People is that well... nothing actually. Along the same lines of the far superior The Squid and the Whale, Smart People is about self-absorbed academics and their dysfunctional families. That's where the similarities end though.
There's just not enough memorable lines or scenes in this movie and the emotional growth the characters undergo is contrived and hokey. Thank god for (a pre-Juno) Ellen Page, who's as caustic as ever, even if she's saddled with a strange semi-incestuous sort of love story. I read that this script was bouncing around Hollywood for awhile and now I know why.
