The 2024 Sundance Film Festival is fast approaching and with it comes a stacked lineup including a pair of Kristen Stewart films, the star-studded Freaky Tales, and the latest film from Jesse Eisenberg, A Real Pain. Ahead of the festival, Vanity Fair shared a first look at the highly-anticipated film which sees Eisenberg join forces with Succession favorite Kieran Culkin for a bittersweet journey to Poland after their grandmother’s death. Their trip of remembrance and self-discovery soon gets out of hand when they end up joining a Holocaust tour.
Eisenberg and Culkin play cousins in the feature, and their bond is on full display in the first stills from the feature. Their goal with the trip is to learn more about where they came from and become a little closer to their late grandmother as a result of the experience. While on the tour, they get an unconventional chance to do that, exploring the history of Poland and getting to reminisce along the way. One shot sees Culkin with his arms around Eisenberg‘s neck in an endearing manner that shows both the cousins’ love for each other and the bickering they’ll face as two people in very different stages of their lives. The stars will certainly have a lot of emotions to work through, and a few moments of chaos, as they see the sights.
Previously, Eisenberg has described his and Culkin‘s on-screen bond in A Real Pain as a “funny, fraught relationship” that will make for the perfect dynamic for a comedy dramedy. The setting of the Holocaust tour and the weight of history, however, will put their intergenerational conflict into perspective. “My main goal was to make an unsanctimonious movie set against the backdrop of the Holocaust,” Eisenberg told Vanity Fair. “I don’t like the self-aggrandizing tone of these stories about sensitive subjects—it turns me off creatively. Not because I think they’re doing anything wrong, it just is not my taste.” Taking inspiration from Eisenberg‘s own trip to Poland as well as a previous short story he had written, the film aims to be deeply emotional as it confronts that sensitive history while also weighing the cousin’s personal history and points of view.
Jesse Eisenberg Returns to Sundance With ‘A Real Pain’
Jesse Eisenberg and Kieran Culkin give ‘A Real Pain’ its heartbeat, even as it reaches far beyond the petty, intimate disagreements between two loved ones.
“You hear these old stories of these Old Hollywood directors falling in love with their ingenues,” says Eisenberg, “and I… pic.twitter.com/BK1CTJQhYU
— VANITY FAIR (@VanityFair) January 17, 2024
A Real Pain marks a return to Sundance for Eisenberg after bringing the Finn Wolfhard-led When You Finish Saving the World to the 2022 iteration of the festival. This time around, he’s working with another massively talented team including producers Dave McCary, Emma Stone, and Ali Herting, the latter of whose connections with the crew behind the 2023 Holocaust darling The Zone of Interest allowed them to film in Poland. In addition to Eisenberg‘s yuppie David and Culkin‘s drifter Benji, the cast features Will Sharpe as their tour guide and Jennifer Grey as a fellow sightseer.
The 2024 Sundance Film Festival kicks off tomorrow, January 18 with A Real Pain as part of the lineup. Stay tuned here at Collider for more of our coverage as the event gets underway. In the meantime, check out our list of films we’re most anticipating from the festival.
via Collider