Away We Go (2009)

"A movie with memorable and engaging performances.  Claudia Puig, USA Today
"...absolutely extraordinary  Peter Travers, Rolling Stone

Editor's Note Director Sam Mendes (AMERICAN BEAUTY) may invoke plenty of indie-comedy tropes in this comic venture, but AWAY WE GO is a tender, sweet, and surprisingly funny addition to the genre. Verona De Tessant (Maya Rudolph, SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE) is six months pregnant, but she and her boyfriend, Burt Farlander (John Krasinski, THE OFFICE), aren?t tied down to their current house in Colorado. A sense of adventure and the desire to find a place to call home propels the couple across North America, stopping in Arizona, Wisconsin, Montreal, and Miami, where they learn the how-to's (and how-not-to's) of parenting from friends and family. The episodic nature of the film allows a variety of talented actors to appear briefly, including Catherine O?Hara and Jeff Daniels as Burt?s flighty parents, Allison Janney as an inappropriate ex-coworker of Verona?s, and Maggie Gyllenhaal and Josh Hamilton as pretentious hippie parents. But the film rests firmly on the capable shoulders of its lead actors; though Rudolph and Krasinski are best known for their TV work, AWAY WE GO allows both performers to shine in ways audiences haven?t seen before. There?s a comfortable chemistry between them, earning authenticity from their strong performances and a good script from real-life spouses Dave Eggers and Vendela Vida. Mendes--who has previously stuck to dramas such as REVOLUTIONARY ROAD and JARHEAD--makes a nice transition to comedy that should appeal to fans of films like GARDEN STATE and LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE. Celebrated cinematographer Ellen Kuras (ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND) lends a lovely, earthy look to the film, while indie singer-songwriter Alexi Murdoch provides a soundtrack that underscores the film?s sweet sincerity.

	Allison Janney
	Jim Gaffigan
	Maggie Gyllenhaal
	Josh Hamilton
	Chris Messina
	Melanie Lynskey
	Paul Schneider
	Jeff Daniels
	Catherine O'Hara
	John Krasinski
	Maya Rudolph
	Dave Eggers - Screenwriter
	Vendela Vida - Screenwriter
	Edward Saxon - Producer
	Marc Turtletaub - Producer
	Peter Saraf - Producer
	Mari Jo Winkler-Ioffreda - Executive Producer
	Pippa Harris - Executive Producer
	Ellen Kuras - Director of Photography
	Alexi Murdoch - Composer
	Randall Poster - Music Supervisor
	Sarah Flack - Editor
	Sam Mendes - Director

Film Comment
"Krasinski's 'baby stroller blow-up' is acted with genuine anarchic spirit, and Rudolph gets a nice monologue under an orange tree toward the film's end." 05/01/2009

Hollywood Reporter
"[The] production values have a nice, grassroots texture, including Ellen Kuras' cinematography and John Dunn's costume design..." 05/22/2009

Box Office
3 stars out of 5 -- "[Rudolph] gives a wonderful turn that is certainly the best work of her career." 06/01/2009

Movieline
"Krasinski and Rudolph do their honest best to play it like a shabbier, less symmetrical Wes Anderson. Naturally Mendes gives them just the right, tasteful music cues to really emphasize the sweetness of it all." 06/01/2009

USA Today
3.5 stars out of 4 -- "John Krasinski and Maya Rudolph are one of the most appealing and believable screen couples to star in a romantic comedy. Not only do they project chemistry, but they adeptly switch between broad comedy and poignancy, sometimes in the same scene." 06/05/2009

A.V. Club
"[A] disarming road comedy about parents-to-be looking for a place to call home....Working from a bright, keenly observed script by married authors Dave Eggers and Vendela Vida, director Sam Mendes embarks on a picaresque journey across North America..." -- Grade: B 06/04/2009

Chicago Sun-Times
3.5 stars out of 4 -- "Burt and Verona are two characters rarely seen in the movies: thirtysomething, educated, healthy, self-employed, gentle, thoughtful, whimsical, not neurotic and really truly in love." 06/10/2009

Washington Post
"[The film] feels like a respite from the false happily-ever-afters of most mainstream movies....The appeal of AWAY WE GO is heightened by its two stars..." 06/12/2009

Total Film
4 stars out of 5 -- ?The screenplay by married novelists Dave Eggers and Vendela Vida is sweary, funny and heartbreakingly tender. It?s also lit up by terrific performances.? 10/01/2009

Entertainment Weekly
"[A] sweet and touching look at a young unmarried couple defiantly trying to put down roots before their child is born." -- Grade: A- 10/02/2009

Chicago Sun-Times 8 of 10
Burt and Verona are two characters rarely seen in the movies: thirtysomething, educated, healthy, self-employed, gentle, thoughtful, whimsical, not neurotic and really truly in love. Their great concern is finding the best place and way to raise their child, who is a bun still in the oven. For every character like this I've seen in the last 12 months, I've seen 20, maybe 30, mass murderers...The almost perfect relationship of the unmarried Verona and Burt seems to survive inside a bubble of their own devising, and since they can blow that bubble anywhere, they of course find the perfect home for it, in a scene of uncommon sunniness. They have been described as implausibly ideal, but you know what? So are their authors, Eggers and Vida. They are thirtysomethings. With two children. Novelists and essayists. He publishes McSweeney's, she edits the Believer...I submit that Eggers and Vida are admirable people. If their characters find they are superior to many people, well, maybe they are. "This movie does not like you," sniffs Tony Scott of the New York Times. Perhaps with good reason. - Roger Ebert