A comic actor’s transition into dramatic roles is often a delicate, finely hewn process, one that requires thoughtful consideration not only of befitting tonal shifts, but also of the performer’s adjusted career trajectory. It is the kind of leap that, when approached with subtlety and poise, can manifest as less of a deviation and more of a natural progression.

A maneuver that, with careful finesse, can be done perceptively—think Bill Murray in Lost in Translation, Adam Sandler in Punch Drunk Love, or Jim Carrey in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind—but it can also result in a performance that relies too heavily on sentimentality and conspicuous restraint, making viewers all too aware that the actor is, indeed, Acting—Carrey in The Majestic comes to mind. There’s a fine line between astute and audacious. Some comics have a knack for remaining understated while others cannot seem to detach the animation from their performance.

Kristen Wiig is an exquisitely talented comedienne. Her ability to draw laughs from the most mundane actions is nonpareil. In my opinion, she outshines all of her fellow Saturday Night Love contemporaries, meeting her match only in Julia Louis-Dreyfuss, who admittedly boasts a few Seinfeldian years to her advantage. Wiig can deliver a line or smirk with such a knowing comedic aplomb that any less-than-uproarious reaction can be perceived as a minor disappointment. Each performance, whether it is featured in a five-minute Target Lady sketch or in Bridesmaids, fulfills what has undoubtedly become Wiig’s duty to make us guffaw at her every turn.

Unfortunately, this intrinsic capability of finding the funny in the minutiae works against Wiig in her role as Johanna Parry in Liza Johnson’s adaptation of Alice Munro’s short story Hateship Loveship. The film takes a somber look at the disintegration and recovery of an assortment of relationships: familial, friendly, romantic, parasitic.

Johanna, a former caretaker of an elderly woman, moves into the home of Mr. McCauley (Nick Nolte), a grandfather seeking assistance around the house as well as with looking after his granddaughter, Sabitha (Hailee Steinfeld). The adolescent’s mother, McCauley’s daughter, died in a boating accident, the blame of which falls on the shoulders of Sabitha’s addict father, Ken (Guy Pearce).

The film sets itself up with elements that could easily be played for knee-jerk sentimentality, but thankfully Johnson avoids such cliché developments. Johanna is the target of a mean-spirited prank, but instead of playing the victim and dwelling on her misfortune, Johanna turns betrayal into an opportunity, upending her sad-sack circumstances.

Sabitha is portrayed by Steinfeld with a searing force that suggests her pain without drawing too near cookie-cutter Mean Girl mannerisms. The young actress lacks an everyday accessibility, but makes up for it through her fierceness and the angst of a grieving teenager. And Pearce’s Ken, while shaky in his past parenting choices, is a conflicted man with desires to do better while tethered to the going-nowhere road of drug addiction. Rather than chewing the coke-addled scenery and running rampage with his dependency, Pearce delivers a more subdued, believable take on the implications of human shortcomings.

Though outwardly meek and mousy, Wiig’s portrayal of Johanna comes across with an underlying shade of farce, a characteristic that the actress is clearly attempting to dislodge. Instead of aiding her depiction of Johanna as a believably timorous outcast, Wiig’s flat, monotone voice invokes memories of her former SNL characters, like a fusion of one-upper Penelope and Sexy Shana. Something as unremarkable as eating peaches out of a can, when done with Wiig’s droll sensibility, is read as comical, regardless of context. The actress has yet to access a capacity for discreetness and, despite her best efforts, dispels a sheath of humor with each passing moment. She is so adept at presenting the humor of a situation that she cannot seem to remove it from her repertoire.

Hateship Loveship deserves props for overturning what could’ve been another indie melodramatic tearjerker. Instead, the film depicts characters attempting to build better futures on the foundations of apathy. If only Wiig had reined in her droll sensibilities a bit more, the film might have managed to leave the ground. Comedy is hard (I think Shia LaBeouf said that), but when it comes as effortlessly as it does to Wiig, her inability to Not Be Funny only speaks to her comedic talent and prowess. It’s a skill that most comedians would die to possess, and one that Wiig should be proud to display.