Maybe you've been in the situation – an older cousin or an aunt is doing community theater. You go, and while it is great to see someone you love strut their stuff, it is nonetheless painful to watch them inch through a poorly constructed, amateurish scenario.  That's what seeing Diane Keaton and (to a lesser extent) Michael Douglas is like in And So It Goes. It's an uncomfortable experience, embarrassing for everyone involved not because of any squeamish subject matter – quite the contrary, seeing retirement-age characters are refreshing – but because the story structure is so fake and so plodding.  In a story set in the wilds of suburban Connecticut, Douglas plays Oren, a widower and real-estate agent living in a modest apartment complex as he tries to make one last big sale – his old multi-million dollar mansion. He's an acid-tongued grump, but with a soupçon of rascally charm. (The screenwriter Mark Andrus' previous work includes the Jack Nicholson vehicle As Good As It Gets.)  Keaton's Leah, a childless widow in the unit next door, is a toned-down version of her Annie Hall persona. The peculiar sartorial choices and nightclub singing routines are intact, but Leah has a habit of bursting into tears during her performances (the film's only funny running gag). We meet the pair in quibble res so it's clearly only a matter of time until they admit a love for one another. To speed the process along, a moppety 10-year old girl, Sarah, is dumped on their doorstep.  Sarah (Sterling Jerins) is Oren's granddaughter, whom he's never met, because he and his son (a drug-taker!) are estranged. But the son has to go off to prison for a while, so looks like the old crabapple is going to learn how to make bologna sandwiches and go on carnival rides and eventually learn how to love again. As Marc Shaiman's syrupy piano score drips cinematic diabetes over scenes like little Sarah calling Leah “grandma” or shooting an iPhone video of a caterpillar transforming into a butterfly, Andrus' script goes all-in on the most hackneyed of sitcom staples. Grouchy Oren actually has to deliver the baby of one of the upstairs neighbors. I was waiting for the moment when they'd all get trapped in a meat locker.  And So It Goes is betting that your familiarity with the characters will, by their sheer force of presence, “win you over”. I say: stand your ground. I adore hearing Diane Keaton's unique patter and line delivery (everything she says sounds as if her mind has already raced three sentences ahead), but when she is trapped in so banal a story I find it more infuriating that this is the material she is reduced to. Two years ago she appeared opposite Kevin Kline in another high tax bracket comedy, Lawrence Kasdan's Darling Companion. This was a movie where wealthy people walked around looking for a lost dog and it wasn't exactly well-received. Compared to And So It Goes, it is a masterpiece.  Shockingly, And So It Goes is directed by Rob Reiner, a man whose name used to represent quality. The son of comedy icon Carl Reiner who began his career as Mike “Meathead” Stivic on All In The Family, Reiner had an amazing streak in the 80s and early 90s. This Is Spinal Tap, The Sure Thing, Stand By Me, The Princess Bride, When Harry Met Sally and Misery (all in a row!) are in no danger of losing their luster. But Reiner's recent output has been one humiliation after another.  And So It Goes is distributed by the new, small-shingle Clarius Entertainment, which also put out this year's insultingly wretched Legends of Oz: Dorothy's Return. To be in such company ought to be enough of a clue to Mr Reiner that, perhaps, he ought to consider sticking with acting. (He has a tiny role in this film and gets the only true belly laugh with a throw-away line.)  It is unfortunate that there are so few good Hollywood films about senior citizens. It's been a long time since we saw Art Carney in Paul Mazursky's Harry and Tonto. And So It Goes features a moment in which a young realtor colleague explains to Douglas how he found out information about his son: “I Googled him. I friended him on Facebook. We've been texting.” It's a word salad of scary “new” technology, and while the digital divide between generations is a real thing, the sledgehammer-like subtlety of this moment (the quotes are verbatim) is an indicator at the level of nuance found in this film.  And So It Goes opens in the US on 25 July, Australia on 7 August and in the UK later this year
The guy who made Spinal Tap, Michael Douglas playing grouchy and Annie Hall. What could go wrong? Pretty much everything