I ♥ Huckabees

When the environmental activist Albert Markovski runs into the same stranger three times he decides it must mean something and hires the existential detectives Bernard and Vivian Jaffe. The couple follow their clients' lives trying to prove that everything is connected. On the other side is their former student Caterine Vauban, who argues that everything is meaningless and accidental. Everyone around Albert is pulled into one camp or the other, and it all comes apart in a house fire. David O. Russell directed and wrote it with Jeff Baena. Dustin Hoffman, Lily Tomlin, Jude Law, Jason Schwartzman, Mark Wahlberg, Naomi Watts and Isabelle Huppert are in the cast, and Jonah Hill and Ger Duany make their screen debuts. Russell traces the idea to an abandoned restaurant concept and a dream about spiritual detectives. In 2007 leaked video showed arguments between Russell and Lily Tomlin on set. Tomlin later explained it by saying David was under a tremendous amount of pressure, and praised his creative approach. On a 20 million dollar budget it took roughly 20.1 million worldwide, breaking even. Rotten Tomatoes sits at 63 percent and Metacritic indicates a mixed response, with critics divided over the existential subject and its originality. Who it is for: viewers who like fast, crowded comedies that mock philosophy. Who it is not for: anyone wanting an ordered story. The film piles its ideas on top of each other and follows none of them to the end.