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This is a story about "a sad man", as one character calls him. Warren Schmidt, very quietly played by Jack Nicholson, has just retired, but he hasn't really accomplished anything his entire life. Some young guy easily takes over the his job of 40 years at an insurance company. He doesn't have much of a relationship with his wife, and his relationship with his daughter is worse. He has good intentions, but he is nonetheless a failure. As James Berardinelli says in his review, Warren Schmidt is "the kind of man that we often meet in real life, but rarely see on screen."

About Schmidt isn't the full-fledged farce that the wonderful Election (director Alexander Payne's previous film) was, but it can be very darkly funny at times. Still, despite the humor, and despite the nominally happy ending, this is a tragic story about a lonely man. It's all the more sad because the tragedy is not cataclysmic; it's utterly ordinary. The story is a cautionary tale of what happens when we go through life on autopilot. Warren Schmidt has always thought that must be doing the right thing if he has a job, a wife, and a child. When he loses them, one by one, it might be too late to finally start thinking things through.

No review of About Schmidt would be complete without a mention of Nicholson's performance. He's known for being flamboyant and full of life. Here, he is subdued and pathetic. The flamboyance in this film belongs to Roberta (Kathy Bates), the polar opposite of Warren Schmidt. Whether she's displaying joy or anger, Roberta is frighteningly enthusiastic. Kathy Bates is just never boring.

I was surprised by the emotional effect this movie had on me. I think it's partly because the lessons can apply just as much to those of us experiencing "quarter-life crises" and partly because I fear that it applies all too directly to certain people who are close to me.