The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

Good films always raise compelling questions, whether the format is fiction or documentary fact.

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

Actress is magnificent and exudes a hypnotic screen presence in this affecting drama.

Maggie's PlanIt has few tricks and turns under its sleeve that just keeps hitting on the screen frame by frame and is balanced so perfectly that it creates a perfect arc for the characters and tickles you along with it too which just defines the excellence in writing department. Rebecca Miller; the co-writer and director, has got everything in the right place that factors in more than anticipated along with its brilliant execution skills. Greta Gerwig is convincingly good in her role as a confused and failed socialist and is supported thoroughly by Ethan Hawke, Julianne Moore and Bill Hader. Maggie's Plan has an eerie combination of a twisted love story and dysfunctional family drama out of which if anything that audience brings home with them, is its pragmatic yet hilarious characters.

'Maggie's Plan' is a fairly simple romantic-comedy - quite light and breezy, with a few laughs and nothing too dramatic to bog it down. Maggie (Gerwig) works at a New York university and her "plan" is to have a child by herself, since she's ready to be a mother (she's only meant to be 29, mind) and "borrows" some sperm off an old friend. The "plan" goes astray when she meets John (Hawke), a professor/anthropologist who's trying to write a novel, and falls in love with him.This is obviously further complicated by the fact John's married to Georgette (Moore), another professor - but she's Danish - and Maggie unwittingly becomes a homewrecker. She technically ends up with three kids - hers and John's, plus her two step-kids John & Georgette already had. Tony (Hader) and Felicia (Rudolph) play her long-married friends and have most of the laugh-out-loud moments. After a few years, Maggie's sick of John and her new "plan" is to get him back together with Georgette, which Tony accidentally gives away.The film's not as madcap as it may sound, and Gerwig plays Maggie as innocent and charming. It's real fun watching Hawke & Moore out of their comfort zone - Hawke as the bumbling/ignorant guy who has no idea what's going on in his life and Moore as a straight-and-narrow foreigner, but her accent is hilarious and her character a little deeper than it first appears. The film probably needed a bit more of Hader & Rudolph, but it's all quite sweet and nice, including the ending.

The actors are really good in this. And you really feel for them, even when they go through stuff, where you might go "so what?"! But it can still feel like a drag for some, which is why the viewers are split on this one. I did enjoy personally to a degree, but it's still not as good as some other indie movies are.What may be surprising to some, is the casual nudity that is being displayed. On the other hand I heard Americans are not as frigid anymore as they used to be ... generally speaking, not when it comes to the rating board of course. But this is more than just a shell, it's about how to grow up, when to grow up and what to make of ones life ... Which boils down to decisions ...

Okay, my first impression was...that guy looks familiar. Where have I seen him before? His movements look so familiar....wait, is that...Ragnar Lothbrok? And he's selling pickles? Okay, where will this movie go 'cuz now I'm watching it.And....it goes where so many pretentious New York movies go....into that realm where adults are BFFE's and living a life that can not possibly be lived if this movie was filmed in the suburbs of say, anywhere that isn't New York. I didn't find Julianne Moore's and Ethan Hawke's relationship all that convincing. Or maybe it was poor development of Hawke's character that was the problem. It is implied that he was once (maybe?) as ambitious as his wife, but not so much anymore? They just came off as a mismatch. And Maggie's character wasn't built strong enough to bat on that power duo's team. And what was with the kumbaya polygamist mothering with the two women? Suddenly, all is well in their world? Aggh, New York, I guess. At least that's what the writer wants us to believe.In this movie, people talk a lot, rather fast, and they all have a tendency to mumble. I found that distracting. It's not a terrible movie to sit through, but it might make you want to eat some good pickles.