Brothers is the best film regarding the dynamics of family relationships I’ve seen in a while. It starts off by showing one brother who is a captain in the military, and the other brother who is just being released from prison. You get a clear sense of which brother has taken the right plan in life and which hasn’t.
Tobey Maguire plays Captain Sam Cahill and Jake Gyllenhaal plays his ex-con brother Tommy. Sam leads a noble life. He’s a military man and a good family man as well. His wife Grace, played by Natalie Portman, adores him as does their children. Tommy, on the other hand, has no job obviously and no place to live. So he stays with Sam and his family. Sam is getting ready to be deployed to Afghanistan. They have a family dinner with their father and stepmother since one brother is being welcomed home and the other is preparing to leave for a while. Their father is a retired marine sergeant himself and he makes it quite clear that his military son is the one he is proud of. This brings some inner-family tension but Sam doesn’t take sides with his father; he loves Tommy for who he is. After all, he had no problem taking him in after his stint in prison.
Sam takes off to Afghanistan and his mission turns tragic. Grace is informed of her husband’s death. She then lets Tommy know as well. His immediate reaction is anger, not sadness. He wishes Sam never went into the military. You also feel that he resents his father for paving the way down that road. Suddenly, Tommy starts to become the man of the household. He begins to look after Grace and her two daughters. The children take a strong liking to Tommy now that they see this caring side of him. Grace had a genuine dislike of Tommy before, but now they begin to bond.
If you’ve seen any trailers for this movie, you already know that Sam is not really dead. He was either mistaken for dead or assumed to be, but he in fact became a prisoner of war. Scenes of Sam held captive along with another soldier are interspersed with scenes of Tommy back home with the family. Sam goes through a harrowing ordeal of torture while his family is trying to move on without him. Eventually, he is rescued and returns home.
He comes home a changed man. He does not want to speak of what he has gone through and pretty much keeps to himself. His family senses the change and slowly becomes more and more worried about him. There is now tension between the two brothers as well since Sam now suspects Tommy of sleeping with his wife. Tobey Maguire shows much more range here than in previous work and it’s intriguing to watch this once loving family man become a distant and closed recluse of a person. There’s a lot of good acting here, even by the two children who play the daughters. The film moves at a good pace and builds up to some intense suspense as you wonder what will become of Sam Cahill. How will his family adapt to his new persona, and can they be the family they once were? See this film if you want something different and don’t mind that it’s not one of those feel-good movies simply spreading cheer to the audience. It’s moving and makes you wonder what you would do in similar situations.
3 1/2 stars









