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Review

Will (Lukas Haas), a troubled writer who abruptly disappeared five years ago, suddenly returns unannounced to the lakeside cabin where his childhood best friend’s parents live. When Will is evasive to their questions about where he’s been and what he’s been doing, the parents invite their son Daniel (Adam Scott), now a successful and arrogant New York writer who has become distant himself, to come up to the lake house along with Will’s wife, Maggie (Molly Parker), who is still furious over Will’s sudden departure long ago. Only slowly does it become clear what precipitated the still-simmering rift between the friends, but that isn’t the last revelation in a film full of surprising turns. Gradually, the complicated layers of resentment and broken trust are uncovered in a series of poignant scenes rendered with expertly nuanced writing and acting. It’s precisely this adroitness in portraying the difficulty and frustration of old lovers trying to express their complex emotions of love and betrayal, whether in quiet, late-night conversations or in extravagantly self-destructive gestures, that makes Who Loves the Sun much richer than the often rote stories of love triangles found in many character-driven films.

 -- Jesse Dubus