Too often films that try to be fun and amusing while they tackle larger issues miss the mark on both. This one hits nicely. Director Paul Weitz (About A Boy, American Pie) leaves much of the adolescent humor behind but keeps a playful appeal. Dennis Quaid is a natural as Dan Foreman, fifty-one-year-old successful Manhattan ad exec. Happily married to Ann (Marg Helgenger) and contentedly saddled with daughters, Jana and Alex (Scarlett Johansson), the family gets a shake up when Carter Duryea (Topher Grace) joins Dan’s company. As rumors circulate that multinational global hotshot corporation Synergy will buy the company, Carter leaps at the chance to jump on board. With little actual experience but loads of longing and his eyes on the prize, neophyte Carter is moving into Dan’s choice corner office at Sports America.

A comic drama with a generous spark of unsentimental warmth, this one will appeal to a wide audience in the vein of Father of the Bride, but leaves a little something to chew on in its wake. I’ve always harbored a suspicion that many a young flame that burns early and bright harbors a deep bewilderment about what the heck happened to catapult them to the top. Topher Grace as Carter glides through the stages of boyish success, clueless failed newlywed, and well meaning but inept manager, with an unnatural relaxation that is right on target. When he begins to fall for Alex, the unconventional business and family reorganization becomes a challenge. Alex yearns to spread her wings away from home at NYU. Dan is protective of his daughters and in the dark about the developing romance. He’s dubious but trying to adapt to his new young boss. A midlife surprise for he and Ann complicate matters, and when long time colleagues are forced out, and his career threatened, who will land on his feet becomes the interesting question.

In a direct hit on the slacker X generation, the composite corporation Synergy, led by a bizarre messiah-like Malcolm McDowell, comes across as a vision of your worst nightmare as a place to work. The core of the story is about achieving success the tried and true way – work you enjoy, good people to work with, and a little luck. Wietz fleshes it out with honesty, humor, and attractive New York locations that combine to make this film more than first meets the eye. Quaid offers a little nod to American Pie at a party prank at Dan’s 52^nd surprise birthday party, but the heart of the film is an ode to some much maligned old-fashioned values that deride the notion that image is everything. You can talk about building castles on sand, people will pay you lots of money to do so for a little while, and you never have to produce the castles. But the not quite inevitable outcome In Good Company scores one for "our" side. The ensemble cast and well-chosen songs round out this entertaining film with spirit.