'Meet Bill' is a mixed bag of rather uninteresting emotions

Meet Bill
Cast: Aaron Eckhart, Logan Lerman, Elizabeth Banks
Director: Bernie Goldmann and Melissa Wallack
Rating: **

Bernie Goldmann and Melissa Wallack debut as directors with this uneven tale about an uninteresting man, Bill who is stuck in an unrewarding job in his in-laws’ firm while his wife seeks solace elsewhere.

Bill is quite despondent when his father-in-law persuades him to mentor an obnoxious kid and voila! Bill's existence suddenly finds value. Certainly there's nothing earth-shattering or ingenious about the story, neither is it the run-of-the-mill kind.

There was much that could have been done with the basic premise. A lot of screen-time was wasted in establishing Bill's discontentment. The unimpressive Bill being married to a sophisticate does appear improbable.

The narrative explains this away as the sophisticate's rebellion against parental expectations. Which is quite acceptable upto a point. But the reasoning falls flat when we don't see the rudiments of the rebellion.

Eckhart and Lerman show-off a great rapport but Eckhart and Banks appear too deadened in their together scenes to garner any sympathy for either character. This one is a mixed bag at best!