Igby Goes Down – DVD

Meet Igby Slocumb (Kieran Culkin). He’s an angry, rebellious and sarcastic seventeen year old at war with the stifling world of ‘old money’ privilege into which he was born. Igby’s life and family seem one of privilege on the surface, but he’s figuring things out are completely different underneath. His father, Jason, (Bill Pullman) is away, "recuperating from life" after a sad slide into schizophrenia. His mother, Mimi (Susan Sarandon), is fierce, distant and self-absorbed, with a long-term dependency of "little peppies" to get through the day. And his older brother, Oliver (Ryan Phillipe), is a shark-like young Republican on the fast-track to materialism at Columbia University. All in all, Igby figures there’s a better life out there – and sets about finding it. After flunking out of yet another prep school, Igby is sent to a Midwest military academy, and from there, with his mother’s pilfered credit card, he goes "on the lam". His darkly comedic voyage eventually leads to New York, where he hides out at his godfather’s (Jeff Goldblum) weekend pied-a-terre.

Avoiding his family, Igby falls in with a host of questionable characters, including his godfather’s trophy girlfriend (Amanda Peet), her flamboyant pal, Russell (Jared Harris) and the terminally bored Sookie Sapperstein (Claire Danes). In his quest to free himself from the oppressive dysfunction of his family and figure out what he wants for himself, Igby’s struggles veer from comic to tragic in an ultimately noble attempt to keep himself from "going down".