Matt Greene Smashed is about alcoholism, certainly. But it's also about marriage. Growing as an individual is great, but how does that affect the relationship you have with your spouse? Must you both grow together in order to not grow apart? Taking a unique point-of-view and harboring another impressive turn from future-awards-winner Winstead, this is a difficult and uncomfortably honest little romantic drama from a talented young filmmaker.

SnoopyStyle Kate (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) and her husband Charlie Hannah (Aaron Paul) are a couple of drunks. His life is a series of drinking, partying, and listening to bands. Only for her, things have gone from embarrassing to scary. After some disturbing events, she goes to AA for help.Drunk acting is arguably the toughest type of acting. For Aaron Paul, this is second nature. For Mary Elizabeth Winstead, this is a departure from her usual sweet pretty girl roles. It's always great to see an actor stretch. She does a good B+ job. I hope she continues to stretch.The story is unsensationalized serious realism. Some will find problems with the modest script. It is a short 80 minutes. There isn't some crazy hurdles for Kate to overcome. Her difficulties are reasonable problems that most hardcore drunks face. There is limited embellishments in this movie. Nick Offerman does one crazy line of dialog. That's the extend of embellishing in this one.

thealefmagnus While Aaron Paul has long shown his calibre in previous projects, he continues to surprise by turning simple choices of words into an emotionally charged line. If you are looking for films with fine acting performances, you have to include Smashed on your list. The film follows the story of an alcoholic couple and the fall of their marriage when one of them decides to be sober.Kate Hannah doesn't realize she is an alcoholic until something happens to her that make her question her actions. As a pre-school teacher, Kate is not the obvious role model for the kids when she shows up to work still hungover from last night's ride. She even pukes in the middle of the class, using the excuse that she's pregnant when one of her students asked if she is. This incident wasn't enough to cause her to come to her senses. She realizes the problem when a stranger offers her to smoke crack while she was drunk. While nothing really bad happened to her, it was enough of a wake-up call for her to start taking steps for her own good.Luckily for her, co-teacher and confidante Dave reveals that he was an alcoholic and that he regularly attends Alcoholics Anonymous meetings. During her first session, she meets and falls in awe of Jenny's story, her soon-to-be sponsor in the film. Jenny helps her go through the 12 Step process by guiding her through simple conversations. Conflict arises when Kate realizes she can't stay sober unless her husband stops drinking in front of her.Tender, sweet, and raw are three things that come to mind whenever I look back at seeing the movie. It wasn't preachy and it wasn't overly dramatic but it gets its point across. One of the best scenes you'd have to watch out for *SPOILER* is when Kate goes into relapse after making a decision to stay honest (one of the points in the 12 Step to change). Kate's life falls apart while she was sober: a thing she points out in the film. I love the contrast of the film in its storytelling.Heartbreaking and with an ambiguous ending, Smashed is going to leave you in pain and hoping for the best but you will have to leave it to how you interpret Kate's closeup shot at the end. With a great performances from the whole cast, the films succeeds in telling a story of change and the sacrifices you have to make in keeping true to what you want to achieve. The only thing I could leave you is that Mary Elizabeth Winstead is going to be around longer because of her performance in this, especially when she says, "Let's do some shots" repetitively. Aaron Paul's last lines in the film is something that you will take with you when credits start to roll. Let's just say I replayed it 3 times.With the direction of James Ponsoldt, he was able to turn this piece he co-wrote with Susan Burke, into a cinematic, contemporary work of art. It's definitely deserving of its win in Sundance 2012 for the US Dramatic Special Jury Prize for Excellence in Independent Film Producing.Smashed is an original piece that will make you wish for more films to have the same quality.writelikesundance.wordpress.com

Chris L Banal and of no real interest, these are two terms that define pretty well Smashed. The scenario is pretty weak, we are on auto pilot from start to finish, everything is more or less predictable and unfolds unsurprisingly. The cast, though good on paper especially considering the presence of Aaron Paul, is almost transparent, struggling to make the most of their characters who cruelly lack depth. Besides, Smashed serves us up all the stereotypes of the alcoholism theme: AA meetings, sponsor, bad company, etc. The situations, characters, have all been been (better) treated dozens of times in other movies.At least, Ponsoldt deserves credit for his cinematography, though the ultra typical "indie" style can be irritating, and for not dragging the story too much (the movie is only 1h15).