It comes as no surprise that Hollywood's ultimate baby boomer Rob Reiner would direct this tale of boomer woe starring two of the hottest boomers in the business: Diane Keaton and Michael Douglas.

It's no surprise that he cheerfully embraces the mawkish and sentimental (after all, he directed The Bucket List and Rumour Has It), but what is disappointing is how tired and clunky this all feels. More so given it comes from the Oscar winning pen of Mark Andrus (As Good As It Gets). Not that he's strayed terribly far from a bankable formula with Douglas (Behind The Candelabra) in the Nicholson character of an ill-tempered curmudgeon (Oren Little) who revels in the knowledge that people don't like him very much at all.

Oren lives next door to Leah (Keaton), a weepy woman still tender from the death of her husband. He nurses his own grief by turning it into resentment and anger, and so the pair bicker freely until forced together when Oren's son (on the way to jail) drops off the grand daughter he didn't know he had. Absolving his duty, Leah becomes a proxy Grandma and the bickering continues. There's more, but nothing you didn't expect, either because Leah and Oren frequently tell each other the plot, or because you've seen it all before. Probably in a film directed by Rob Reiner.

And So It Goes marks the first time Keaton and Douglas have appeared together and, when not saddled by the awkward narrative, they reveal a pleasing chemistry. Not that either of them are doing anything new: Douglas growls while Keaton smiles, cries and sings (Leah is a small-time jazz chanteuse, yet another nod in a lifetime of homage to Annie Hall). They're easy company, but come the moment of reconciliation – like you didn't know there'd be one – And So It Goes has gone hardly anywhere at all. Given how few films tackle the challenges of growing old, this is a frustrating waste of talent and opportunity. “Unbelievable!” screams Leah. Yes, it is.

// COLIN FRASER

Previewed at the Reel Room Theatrette, Sydney on 26 May 2014