Critic Reviews

By the time its open-ended conclusion rolls around, you've forgotten you're watching a "comedy." All you can see in front of you are complicated, impetuous real people -- and that's about the biggest compliment any filmmaker could hope for. [06 Feb 1997, p.5F]

The young writer-director, Greg Mottola, deals forthrightly with trust and betrayal and the destructive tensions in family relationships, whether they're well-worn or freshly hurtful. But he never loses his sense of perspective or humor, and neither does his cast. [04 Apr 1997]

Comic-ensemble performance at its darkest.

Thanks to the superb cast and Mottola's deft touch, this modest-looking comedy proves quite memorable.

When you’re through watching The Daytrippers, you think about its minor imperfections, not because the film’s bad, but because it’s so good.

Greg Mottola's feature directorial debut, is an amusing farce about the delicate intricacies and imbalances of a modern marriage. A spirited cast, including old pros such as Anne Meara and younger talent such as Parker Posey, elevates the basically sitcom material into something fluffier and funnier than its nature suggests.

The Daytrippers is an assured debut which engages the brain as well as tweaking the laughter lines.

Daytrippers is so well-crafted that you may make it more than halfway through before wondering whether the story will sustain any lasting emotional power. It does -- but not in the way you think it's going to.

Writer-director Greg Mottola's first feature is a deceptively quiet and funny film that sticks in your memory long after you think you've left the theatre.

The Daytrippers is at its best using parody to paint an incisively humorous picture of a modern American family. We see here just how dysfunctional the typical nuclear family can be, and that "family values" aren't always the solution. Even though The Daytrippers is played primarily for laughs, there's a lot of truth lurking beneath the comic exterior.