production quality cast premise authentic new england waterbury ct locale lush john williams score resulted  star collectors item unfortunately got passable  star decent flick mostly memorable tried dobring art house style film mainstream small town locale story ordinary people genre itself well done satisfy grownups jane fonda unable hide braininess enough make character believable wondered post doctorate yale instead working dead end factory job waterbury robert diniros character bit contrived illiterate nice guy loser turns actually be little help janes character  version henry ford thomas edisonbr br this genre successfully handled nobodys fool mid s years  about schmidt wish main stream studios would try stuff post adolescents reserve couple screens multi cinema complexes effortsbr br ill give a effort