Appearances can be deceiving, both in people and in the arts. Longtime producer and first-time director Marc Turtletaub crafts together a soft, tender story of a middle-aged woman (Kelly Macdonald – Anna Karenina, No Country for Old Men) searching for an identity she didn’t even know she was searching for in the understated, well-executed Puzzle. It’s a movie that, despite its premise and, specifically, its non-descript trailer, gives life to a well-narrated tone that explores each of its five lead characters in a way you would never think that competitive puzzle-building could. I only saw this movie because I was trying to break my record for the number of films I saw in one year. As I approached triple digits, few remained that caught my eye as something I needed to see. However, the 83% critic/78% audience score for Puzzle was enough for me to try the movie, and I needed only to see the first 15 minutes or so to know that this was a movie I would also be reviewing.

Agnes (Macdonald) is a woman approaching 45 years of age who has yet to experience life. She has a good life, probably one she had always envisioned. She lives in the small blue-collar town of Bridgeport, Connecticut, nothing more than a stone’s throw (or, in this case, a doable rain ride) to New York City. She’s married to Louie (David Denman – NBC’s The Office, The Gift), a good, family-providing man she loves and has given her two grown sons. But Louie’s idea of married life is very traditional, with gender roles that Agnes adheres to but begins to despise over time. She’s expected to cook and have dinner ready each day when Louie and oldest son Ziggy (Bubba Weiler – The Ranger, New Life) return home each night from their work as mechanics.

When hosting a party (her own birthday party at that), Agnes serves her guests, cleans up their messes, and even puts candles on a cake she made. Agnes is not involved in family decision-making. This role is specifically for Louie, the family patriarch (Turtletaub lays on us thicker than the frosting on Agnes’s birthday cake). At night, Agnes and Louie seem to have their most profound discussions while brushing and flossing their teeth before bed. Any passion in their relationship has long been lost. Rather than sparks before a night of restful sleep, Agnes identifies Louie’s snoring habits perfectly. Their high school senior son Gabe (Austin Abrams – Tragedy Girls, Brad’s Status) is a bit of a grifter who longs to spend a year touring the world in places like Tibet despite Agnes’s wishes with his girlfriend rather than going to college. It breaks Agnes’s heart when Louie seems to allow this, especially after she sees Ziggy follow his father’s misguided footsteps into a miserable career as a mechanic. The household traditions resemble the 1960s/70s, where the man of the house makes the big decisions, and the wife follows his lead.

Agnes receives a 1000-piece puzzle at her birthday party, which, after starting it, she seems highly adept at. It’s a solitude that Agnes desires, where she can either turn her mind off or take herself to a place that her life might not otherwise allow. After completing the same puzzle several times, Agnes finds herself on a train to New York City, where she discovers a small shop full of complicated puzzles. A wealthy inventor and store owner named Robert (Irfan Khan – The Lunchbox, Life of Pi) is a champion puzzler who happens to be looking for a new puzzle partner after his previous partner (who happens to be his romantic one too) abruptly leaves him. Agnes and Robert form an unlikely friendship as they try to determine if they are compatible puzzling partners (if it sounds super duper cheesy, I assure you it’s more goofy than it sounds). Once they determine they are a suitable team, the remainder of the movie focuses on them practicing for an upcoming championship while Agnes tries to hide what she is doing from her husband. Though it doesn’t interfere with her life, his life, or the life of their grown children, Louie has his idea of how family life should be.

***Start of Spoilers***

Once she meets Robert, Agnes only then realizes how unhappy she is in her marriage, home, and life with Louie. Robert treats her well (as does Louie), but more importantly, he’s interested in her thoughts. He wants to know what she thinks on both trivial and non-trivial matters. He enjoys spending time with her but appreciates her mind as much as he does her companionship. Agnes and Robert do have an affair, and it’s not needed. I wish that Turtletaub had left it for us to interpret if anything more than platonic happened. They shouldn’t have had an affair for a couple of reasons. First, I don’t think they were a fit. There was little flirting between the two to start with. I never felt like Agnes was interested in Robert romantically or vice versa until Turtletaub shoved it on us. Secondly, I would rather have the intrigue between the two remained intellectual. This could have led to a romantic relationship. Still, based on what we know about Agnes until this point, it doesn’t seem like she’s a person who would jeopardize her marriage on someone she had known for such a short period. Regardless of how unhappy she was, behaving in this fashion seemed out of character.

***End of Spoilers***

Puzzle excels at exploring its lead and supporting characters. At just 103 minutes, we get to know Agnes, Robert, and Louie exceptionally well. We also get a solid glimpse of Ziggy and Gabe, who might have been forgotten characters by a different director. Our star is Macdonald’s Agnes, a woman going through a midlife crisis. But Khan is never an actor who will get stood up by anyone. I believe he only appears 25-30 minutes into the film but changes the pace as soon as he does. The movie slows down and becomes a different movie. It becomes a movie of not a woman trying to escape a life that is no longer for her, but rather a film of a woman pushing towards a life of meaning, even if that meaning revolves around building puzzles with a person she has just met. It’s heavy and light-hearted simultaneously. By this, I mean that the topics addressed in the film are serious, but there isn’t much of the usual heaviness involved in movies of this nature. The incredible Take This Waltz came into my head as I wrote this. That movie is similar in situation but heavier in tone (as only the great Michelle Williams can seem to do).

B-

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