Being a great writer/director is not just about finding the right points to instill dramatic tension; it's about finding those dramatic moments where levity is needed. Not all situations are altogether sad or overwhelmingly happy.

Academy Award winner Alexander Payne develops the right mix of lighthearted drama in The Descendants, based on the novel by Kaui Hart Hemmings. Payne--along with his writing collaborators Jim Rash and Nat Faxon--searches for the truths and realities of American life in this film.

The Descendants stars George Clooney as Matt King, a descendant of King Kamehameha. Matt's wife is in a coma in the hospital, leaving Matt to deal with their two teenage daughters. On top of that, the deadline is looming for Matt to make an important decision about whether or not to sell a valuable, family-owned plot of Hawaiian land to real estate developers before the trust expires.

Payne does a great job of mapping out deliberate character reveals. Just when you think you're about to sink into a melancholy moment, he'll shift your attention from the flawed characters suffering on screen--and he does it with true-to-life comedy. This happens in particular with Matt's relationship with his children. He wants them to be kind and respect their mother while she is in a coma, but at the same time his own frustrations cause him to do the opposite.

Although the King family has some status in Hawaii, Payne shows how abundantly "average" they are. Matt loves his children, but his work has kept him distant. With his wife in the hospital he starts to rediscover fatherhood--not easy with his fiery daughter Alexandra (Shailene Woodley, The Secret Life of the American Teenager) and her younger sister Scottie (Amara Miller). You see that the King family's problems are no different from anyone else's, and that sense of humanity will draw you further into this Character Approved story.

[Image: Fox Searchlight Pictures]