The Daytrippers

The Daytrippers is a 1996 independent comedy-drama film written and directed by Greg Mottola in his feature directorial debut. It stars Hope Davis, Stanley Tucci, Anne Meara, Parker Posey and Liev Schreiber.

Plot
Eliza (Hope Davis) discovers a love letter that may prove that her husband Louis (Stanley Tucci) is having an affair, so she decides to go to New York City and confront him. Her family, including her parents Jim (Pat McNamara) and Rita (Anne Meara), her sister Jo (Parker Posey), and Jo's live-in boyfriend Carl (Liev Schreiber), go along for the ride in the family station wagon from Long Island.

Release
The Daytrippers premiered at the Slamdance Film Festival in January 1996 where it won the festival’s first Grand Jury Prize. The film was released in the United States on March 5, 1997. The film opened to 52 theaters and grossed $35,988 in its opening weekend. Overall, the film grossed $2,099,677 domestically. It also received a theatrical release in Australia during October 1997.

Reception
On Rotten Tomatoes the film has an approval rating of 74% based on reviews from 27 critics. On Metacritic it has a score of 73% based on reviews from 18 critics.

Owen Gleiberman of Entertainment Weekly gave it a grade B and compared to the film to David O. Russell's Flirting With Disaster but praised director Mottola as having "a lighter, warmer touch" and that he "keeps the action flowing and gets lively work" from the cast.

On March 28, 1997, Desson Howe of The Washington Post remarked that "The Daytrippers proves that a great movie isn’t a matter of dollars, so much as creativity." In April 1997, Robin Dougherty of Salon also gave it a positive review, calling it "well-crafted", and commenting that "despite the bite independent films took of last year's Oscar field, our movie industry — and our movie-going habits — aren't really supportive of writer-directors whose scope is that of a short-story teller rather than an epic mythmaker." Janet Maslin of The New York Times commented that "the main action of The Daytrippers is bright, real and even poignant enough to make this journey worth the ride." Maslin also praised Posey's performance, commenting that "Jo is played by Parker Posey once again [as] the apotheosis of blase cool."

A negative review at the time came from Siskel and Ebert, who gave the film two thumbs down on the March 8, 1997 episode of their program. Gene Siskel questioned why the movie was even made in the first place, while Roger Ebert commented that, "I got real tired of these characters, they were all whiney and negative [...] they get old real fast, especially Anne Meara."