23 OCTOBER

nd remember, don’t give your heart to any boys. You’re mine, until you get married. And then you’re still mine...” Spoken over a black screen, On The Rocks’ opening lines could be the prelude to a dark psychodrama of paternal possessiveness.

Instead, Sofia Coppola’s latest emerges as a beguiling, souffle-light comedy that could be an aged-up companion piece to the writer/director’s Somewhere (2010). There are also echoes of Woody Allen in the setup, which sees author Laura (Rashida Jones) and her philandering father Felix (Bill Murray) tailing Laura’s possibly faithless husband Dean (Marlon Wayans) all over Manhattan. As the quest takes them further afield, the film almost descends into an Allen-lite farce. But it’s yanked back from the brink by the terrific leads’ lived-in portrayal of a loving but complex dad-daughter relationship.

Conjuring past roles (Coppola’s Lost In Translation, Broken Flowers), Murray essays pure, distilled Murray-ness, charming and disarming everyone in his path (grandkids, waiters, cops) while drolly spouting gender-stereotype bullshit (like that opener) that self-deconstructs on impact. Jones’ reactions to the feckless Felix – whether smiling indulgently or shutting him down – are effortlessly on point. She also nails Laura’s work-life juggling, investing unforced feeling in everything from her writer’s block to those three words that come so easily to parents: “Go to sleep.” Matthew Leyland