Nic and Jules' two kids are 18 year old Joni (Mia Wasikowska) and her 15 year old brother, Laser (Josh Hutcherson). Joni is "as smart as a whip" and will leave home at the end of the summer to be a freshman at a premiere college. She was accepted at every school to which she applied. If Joni is the brains in the family, then Laser is the athlete who excels at high school sports. Normal in almost every respect, both kids are the kind of kids that any parent would be proud to have.

Nic is a doctor at a local hospital who lives a well-ordered life and expects everyone else in the family to do the same. At the moment, the kids are on target, so her quietly disapproving eye turns towards her partner. Jules is her opposite as she has floundered at numerous careers over the years and has never made a go at any of them. Her latest idea is to become a landscape architect, but buying an expensive truck to further this still nascent concept does not strike Nic as being sensible. 

They don't recognize it yet, but they are on the shoals of a dangerous mid-life crisis. As in every relationship, it starts off with the little things. The two aren't communicating the way they used to, both in and out of the bedroom. They now resort to gay porn flicks to enhance their infrequent love life. Jules is hurt by Nic's not being there for her, like when a hospital call interrupts a romantic moment. For her part, Nic has run out of patience with Jules' lack of direction and her inability to develop a viable career, especially since she has to foot the bill for her partner's whimsical extravagances. So the raw emotion of resentment is in place and seething quietly under the surface, waiting for the right catalyst. 

That catalyst has already arrived. Their two children are half-siblings as both share the same biological father and sperm donor to both of the "Moms." Nic gave birth to Joni while Jules gave birth to Laser. Laser has been bugging his sister to get the donor contact information out of the family files since she is now an adult and can legally make this request. Joni accedes to her brother's wishes, and they find that their biological dad is Paul (Mark Ruffalo), a local restauranteur and organic farmer. 

Paul is a likable enough dude who seems to have fried his brains and his ambition by drug use during his youth. The guy has trouble stringing a cohesive sentence together without the words, "like, well, okay, for sure, that's cool, I'm okay with that," and whatnot. He lucked into his business, and further lucked out by its apparent success. A college dropout, he is still unmarried at 50 years of age. With few commitments in his life, Paul is so lazy that he depends upon his own restaurant manager (Yaya DaCosta) for casual sex. I guess that this is also organic and energy saving... The only thing that I liked about the guy is his BMW motorcycle, the same bike that I had in college. 

Nevertheless, Joni and Laser are intrigued by Paul's friendliness and his casual lifestyle, so they want to see more of him. When it slips out that they have made this move behind their parent's backs, all heck breaks loose. Jules and Nic are supposed to be cool with it, but they really aren't, especially with Nic as the family control freak. However they oblige their children and invite Paul over for the obligatory lunch. 

Nic still doesn't warm up to him, but then Paul invites Jules to landscape the property behind his house. Jules accepts because she loves the positive reinforcement, and this will, of course, guarantee Paul's continuing contact with the family members. Perhaps for the first time in his life, Paul finds the twin concepts of family and responsibility appealing.

Lisa Cholodenko deserves a lot of credit for both co-writing (along with Stuart Blumberg) and directing this movie. Julianne Moore and Annette Bening are spot on in their realistic portrayals. Wasikowska and Hutcherson are equally well cast, but this story is really about their parents in a nicely directed and extremely well acted portrayal of a family in crisis.  

Not to say that there aren't flaws with the film. There really isn't enough to Paul's personality to have kept this connection going to the lengths that it did. Meet him, greet him, and then exchange pictures on the holidays. And I didn't for a moment buy Nic's bonding with him over his collection of Joni Mitchell albums. In addition, I found the many sex scenes (though little nudity) to be crude, raw, and unnecessarily jarring in what could have been a better film without them. 104 minutes and Rated R for strong sexual content, nudity, language and some teen drug and alcohol use.