Tobias Menzies and Julia Louis-Dreyfus in You Hurt My Feelings (A24)

Julia Louis-Dreyfus’s expressive comic style elevates writer/director Nicole Holofcener’s tale of clashing views on honesty. This examination of little white lies has less bite than their previous collaboration from a decade ago, the rom-com Enough Said, which co-starred James Gandolfini. Nonetheless, the new film showcases Holofcener’s trademark low-key take on the minor struggles of everyday life among the middle-class, particularly their vulnerabilities.

Beth (Louis-Dreyfus) teaches fiction at Manhattan’s New School and has a successful memoir under her belt. Meanwhile, she nervously awaits feedback from her agent on her first novel. Her husband, Don (Tobias Menzies, The Crown), is a psychotherapist with an array of unhappy patients. When Beth overhears Don tell his brother-in-law, Mark (Arian Moayed, Succession), that he doesn’t care for Beth’s new book—despite telling her he loves it over the course of two years and 20 drafts—she feels sick and embarks on a passive-aggressive response of ignoring him and sleeping on the couch.

White lies are so common in our culture that the words can spill out automatically when we’re trying to spare someone’s feelings. And the script for You Hurt My Feelings is full of fibbers, from Beth’s sheepish writing students, who promise to read her memoir, to one of Don’s patients, who denies he mutters an insult under his breath after each therapy session. Gift giving provides another opportunity for Beth and Don to mask their true feelings. At an anniversary dinner, a pair of earrings and a cashmere sweater are met with false gratitude.

Mark, a struggling actor with a single (embarrassing) credit to his name, and his wife, Sarah (Michaela Watkins, Saturday Night Live), Beth’s sister and a frustrated interior decorator, withhold honesty in their own way, to maintain positivity in their marriage. In her professional life, Sarah humorously bends to a picky client’s taste, ready to “love” a sexually provocative sconce the client chooses. To save face, Mark attempts to avoid disclosing to others that he’s known for his role as a secondary character in a film about a pumpkin.

So, what’s more important: How you feel about your own work or how it is judged by others? An apocalyptic Beth says of Don’s lack of criticism, “He’s a liar…. That he doesn’t think I could take it. Like that alone is so insulting.” Don’s take on the matter is that he loves his wife, so giving positive feedback is a form of encouragement.

A supporting cast of stellar players pepper the activities around the extended family. LaTanya Richardson Jackson is excellent, albeit underused, as Beth’s disappointed agent, who says that Beth is competing with new voices, and “refugees, cancer, murder, abuse.” Real-life married couple Amber Tamblyn and David Cross are hilarious as a bickering pair upset by the lack of progress under Don’s care. Jeannie Berlin credibly plays both withholding and demanding as Beth and Sarah’s difficult mother, who insists on reclaiming clothing she donated to the church giveaway where her daughters volunteer.

The anxiety of aging is a secondary thread that runs throughout, with Beth and others reconsidering their life’s work after disappointments. Don realizes he’s getting his patients confused and considers Botox to look less tired. Mark thinks of quitting acting, but Sarah tells him he can’t because she’s ready to retire. At Mark’s birthday party, Sarah pulls out from her purse Tums, Gas-X, stool softener, and Xanax to take care of any eventuality.

Moderately satisfying, You Hurt My Feelings explores an unlikely topic from multiple angles in a genial and comic way. It premiered at the 2023 Sundance Film Festival, and is now available on demand via multiple platforms.