Keeping Up With the Steins

A Hollywood agent (Jeremy Piven) attends an outlandish bar mitzvah for the son of an obnoxious colleague (Larry Miller) and vows to throw an even bigger party for his own son (Daryl Sabara) when his turn comes in a few months. Mark Zakarin’s script is pretty outlandish itself at times, director Scott Marshall’s approach is slapdash and unfocused, and the movie seems like it should be better than it is. But there’s an earnest sweetness that makes you want to like it, even when it takes some graceless turns. Jami Gertz, as Piven’s wife, is the best thing in the film, but the cast has a lot of talent: Garry Marshall (Scott’s real-life father) and Doris Roberts as Sabara’s grandparents, Daryl Hannah as Grandpa’s hippie girlfriend, Richard Benjamin as a rabbi and Cheryl Hines as the bar-mitzvah planner.