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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
Entertainment
Mark Kermode, Observer film critic

The Skeleton Twins review – Kristen Wiig is engaging in this tale of self-destructive siblings

skeleton twins
Bill Hader and Kristen Wiig in The Skeleton Twins: ‘they portray their love-hate sister-brother intimacy with ease’. Photograph: Courtesy of Skeleton Twins, LLC.

Suicide is no laughing matter, but there are some wry smiles in this changeably moody indie-pic about self-destructive siblings. Kristen Wiig is typically engaging as Maggie, nominally trying for a baby with super-straight husband Lance (Luke Wilson), now providing shelter for slashed-wrist survivor Milo (Bill Hader), the estranged brother to whom she has not spoken in a decade. Both Milo and Maggie are emotional wrecks and it’s clear that their time together will reopen and heal old wounds. It could prove insufferable, but Wiig and Hader have developed a natural affinity over years of working together that enables them to play their love-hate sister-brother intimacy with ease. Full marks, too, to Wilson for making the most of a dorky fall-guy role, into which he injects genuine sympathy – you may not love Lance but he’s as easy to like as his perennially unsatisfied wife insists.

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