Written and directed by Alan Ball
Starring Paul Bettany, Sophia Lillis, Peter Macdissi, Steve Zahn, Judy Greer and Stephen Root
Running time: 1 hour and 35 minutes
MPAA rating: R for language, some sexual references and drug use

by Audrey Callerstrom

Uncle Frank opens with a walk-through of a bustling South Carolina home in the late ‘60s and a venerable who’s-who of character actors. An uncertain teenage Betty (Sophia Lillis) feels lost in the shuffle. We have mother Judy Greer, father Steve Zahn, grandfather Stephen Root, great-grandmother Lois Smith, and her majesty Margo Martindale as Betty’s grandmother. In what proves to be an unnecessary voiceover, Betty explains how the only person she ever felt connected with was her dad’s brother, uncle Frank (Paul Bettany), a university professor who talks to Betty on an adult level. She can be whoever she wants to be, he tells her, heck, she doesn’t even need to call herself “Betty” if she doesn’t want to. It’s her name, after all. She switches to Beth and, a few years later, enrolls at the school in New York where Frank teaches.