Little Men

2016

85 mins

Directed by Ira Sachs
97%
63%
Drama

Filmmaker Ira Sachs follows up critical darling Love is Strange with another New York-set tale following the new friendship of... More

Filmmaker Ira Sachs follows up critical darling Love is Strange with another New York-set tale following the new friendship of two boys who can't avoid their parents' problems.

When 13-year-old Jake’s (Theo Taplitz) grandfather dies, his family moves from Manhattan back into his father’s old Brooklyn home. There, Jake befriends the charismatic Tony (Michael Barbieri), whose single mother Leonor (Paulina García), a dressmaker from Chile, runs the shop downstairs. Soon, Jake’s parents Brian (Greg Kinnear) and Kathy (Jennifer Ehle) — one a struggling actor, the other a psychotherapist — ask Leonor to sign a new, steeper, lease on her store. For Leonor, the proposed new rent is untenable, and a feud ignites between the adults.

At first, Jake and Tony don’t seem to notice; the two boys, so different on the surface, begin to develop a formative kinship as they discover the pleasures of being young in Brooklyn. Jake aspires to be an artist, while Tony wants to be an actor, and they have dreams of going to the same prestigious arts high school together. But the children can’t avoid the problems of their parents forever, and soon enough, the adult conflict intrudes upon the borders of their friendship.

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Where to watch Little Men

Little Men is available to stream in Australia now on... More YouTube and Google TV and Apple TV Store and Prime Video Store.

There is no screening information for this title.

Little Men | Ratings & Reviews

97_%142 reviews
Rotten Tomatoes® rating
63_%7,445 reviews
Audience score rating

"A little movie brimming with little truths about modern life. It won’t change the world, but it does understand it."

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Variety

"If [it] doesn't feel quite as revelatory as Keep the Lights On (2012) or the heartbreaking Love Is Strange (2014), it still impresses you with its quiet, confident maturity."

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Time Out

"Sachs’ approach is so humane, and his characters so fully rendered, that an agenda never announces itself..."

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The Guardian

"There's nothing really memorable from a movie where the number of producers appear to dwarf the actors."

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Stuff

"It's time to realize that Ira Sachs is a modern master. Little Men, with its two boys racing at life with the brick wall of maturity still at a distance, is truly an exhilarating gift."

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Rolling Stone

"A bittersweet charmer."

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New Zealand Herald

"The performances are impeccable. Sachs is a master of expressive understatement, and that applies both to the young actors playing the boys and to the adults."

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