The Lovers is both a tragedy and a satirical comedy, with an absolutely provocative kicker.

| Jan 8, 2018

The Lovers sustains a poignant tone that makes me choke up every time I watch it.

| Dec 26, 2017

Jacobs not only uses comedy to tell a brilliantly crafted and highly believable story, but is also able to keep his audiences hooked till the very end thanks to his impressive screenplay and faultless storytelling prowess.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Oct 17, 2017

A delicate, deadpan comic fable, as if someone gave Boccaccio a camera and an indie film budget.

| Original Score: 2.5/4 | May 19, 2017

"The Lovers" keeps folding, changing and evolving, but stays to its central theme, exploring two uncomfortably real characters who can't get out of the way of each other or themselves.

| Original Score: B+ | May 19, 2017

Jacobs has delivered a two-handed character study and, in this mission, he is handily assisted by his two powerful leads.

| Original Score: 2.5/4 | May 18, 2017

Two fine performances anchor this half-funny, half-brutal story of a midlife marriage in crisis.

| Original Score: 3/4 | May 18, 2017

All four leads bring their A-game to this very adult, very real comedy of midlife crises. Winger is as good here as she's ever been, and Letts, an actor whose face you know but whose name you can never quite remember, is terrific.

| Original Score: 3.5/5 | May 18, 2017

It's tempting to read this as a younger generation's condemnation of its parents' me-first indulgence, and an affirmation of familial unity by an unblinking, accusatory - but not histrionic - look at its opposite.

| Original Score: 2/5 | May 18, 2017

Is romantic comedy dead? Not as long as the genre can accommodate a film as uniquely wonderful as "The Lovers."

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | May 18, 2017

Letts has some fine moments, but it's Winger who really brings the color to this movie, creating a woman filled with disappointment and passion and wit, taking a small-scale comedy of manners to a darker, richer place.

| Original Score: 3/4 | May 17, 2017

The Lovers is buoyant and cheerfully flirty, though Jacobs never loses sight of the fact that loneliness that can strike both inside a marriage and outside it, and no human being is ever fully protected from suffering.

| May 16, 2017

The Lovers, written and directed by Azazel Jacobs, is a strangely gripping movie mostly because of its aversion to over-explaining.

| May 16, 2017

A cautionary tale that never passes judgment, an exploration of the way that love can be a many-splendored thing, with many people, some of them twice.

| May 11, 2017

Just about every step of the way, the dialogue crackles and the performances are electric.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | May 11, 2017

There's really only one joke here -- the 50-ish spouses are every bit as confused, horny, and insecure as kids themselves -- but the two gifted leads play it so gracefully that it sustains the entire movie.

| May 11, 2017

With luck, by the end, you may hear what Jacobs does: the aching romantic movie imprisoned in each of us, desperate for release.

| Original Score: 3/4 | May 11, 2017

Flustered, flirty and filled to the brim with compassion, "The Lovers" is charming, even when it's proving how hollow charm can be.

| Original Score: 3/4 | May 11, 2017

No, this may not be the most original story in the world. But if it is somewhat familiar, it's also well told and exceptionally well-acted.

| Original Score: 3.5/5 | May 11, 2017

We can read the character's history in Letts' face before we know the details. He's miserable, but like he's gotten used to misery. Misery is no big deal.

| Original Score: 3/4 | May 10, 2017