Vincent MacKenna is a retired Vietnam War veteran living in Sheepshead Bay, in Brooklyn. He is grumpy, a gambler, a smoker and a heavy drinker. His wife Sandy has Alzheimer's and no longer recognizes him, though he keeps visiting her and looking after her. His life changes when a newly arrived family, Maggie Bronstein, a radiology technician going through a bitter divorce, and her son Oliver, has a minor run-in with his car. Oliver is a sensitive boy bullied at his Catholic school, and he starts spending afternoons with Vincent, whose ideas about childcare are, to say the least, unconventional. An unexpected bond develops between them, shaped by humor and by the difficulties each of them is facing.

How it was made

Theodore Melfi wrote the screenplay in 2011 under the working title St. Vincent de Van Nuys, and that same year it appeared on the Hollywood Black List of unproduced scripts. Jack Nicholson was rumored for the lead, but Bill Murray signed on in July 2012. Melissa McCarthy, Chris O'Dowd, Naomi Watts and Scott Adsit joined the cast between March and July 2013. Filming began that July in Brooklyn and at Belmont Park racetrack on Long Island. Theodore Shapiro was hired to compose the score in late 2013.

Reception and legacy

The film premiered at the 2014 Toronto International Film Festival, where it was named second runner-up for the People's Choice Award. It opened in limited release on October 10, 2014, and expanded to wide release two weeks later. It grossed about $54.8 million against a $13.5 million budget, and critics were largely positive, with a Metacritic average of 64 out of 100. Murray's performance drew the most praise; Richard Roeper gave the film an A and suggested it could earn him a Golden Globe. Some critics, however, felt its sentimental final stretch went too far.

Stills

Trailer

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Trivia

A script with a history

The screenplay appeared on the 2011 Hollywood Black List of unproduced scripts before it was ever filmed.

Same-day Netflix release

On the same day it opened in theaters, the film was released on Netflix in France.

More films by Theodore Melfi

Hidden Figures2016

Original Cinematopedia text based on Wikipedia (es) and Wikipedia (en) and Wikidata.