Do advice columnists really know what they’re talking about? They may—but the odds are that there’s a lot of “do as I say, not as I do” involved.

Steve Carell plays Dan Burns, author of the soon-to-be-syndicated advice column “Dan in Real Life.” He’s a control-freak work-at-home widower who shepherds his three daughters through the minefields of youth and adolescence. Meanwhile, due to both grief and ineptitude, Dan himself struggles through the minefields of adulthood and adolescence.

The pivotal event in the film’s plot is the annual get-together of the Burns clan on the New England coast. Soon after arriving—and after the requisite competitive ribbing from his brother Mitch, whose latest hot girlfriend will be joining the clan presently—Dan pays a visit to the local bookstore. Here, he runs unexpectedly into a beautiful, captivating, intelligent, globe-trotting adult woman of the world—exactly the kind of woman one of Tom Cruise’s film characters might have fallen for about twenty years ago. And Dan, in his own arrested adolescence, is hooked. Better yet, she’s pretty taken with Dan, too—but meet-cute encounters in bookstores can only last so long, and Dan’s got to get back to the homestead.

And then the bombshell. It turns out that Marie is Mitch’s new girlfriend!

From there, the film becomes a gentle romantic comedy of errors and mores. Can Dan and Marie bring themselves to forego their one chance at true love? How much does Dan owe Mitch, anyway, given that Mitch is a bit of a louse? And how much does Marie owe him? How many times will Dan end up ignoring the advice he has given others over the years, including doing all the things he tells his daughters not to? And how funny will all of this be?

But the real question: can screenwriter Pierce Gardner and director Peter Hedges find some way to get Dan and Marie together without scandalizing Mitch, Mom and Pop Burns, Dan’s daughters, and the audience?

Okay… This is a Touchstone film, so you can bet the House of Mouse will give it a darn good try—and the good news is that Gardner and Hedges pull all of this romp off in pretty good style. Carell is winning as always—even if he makes it all look a little too easy for “acting”—and Dane Cook plays Mitch as about the most affable Cad ever to hit the silver screen. I was even somewhat taken with Juliette Binoche as Marie, and I’m usually pretty mystified by her appeal. Here, though, she’s a very fine match for Carell.

If the film is “about” anything, it’s an affirmation of romantic love, a paean to the institution of marriage, and a salute to the villages that extended families can become—if they try hard enough.

And like a big family get-together, Dan in Real Life is best enjoyed if your expectations aren’t set too high. You know you’ll have some fun, a unexpected thing or two will happen, the experience will feel familiar and really comfortable, and when it’s time to go home you’ll be ready—but you’ll also feel like you’ve spent quality time with people you (mostly) like.

Dan in Real Life is rated PG-13 for “some innuendo.” That’s probably appropriate. Dan’s a bad enough example that you don’t want your kids getting the idea that the stupider things he does are “okay.” But we’ve got the Norbit factor working here, too. Don’t make the mistake of thinking that this PG-13 property is mean-spirited or deliberately offensive. The MPAA has really got to get something sorted out when this film and Norbit get the same rating.

Courtesy of a local publicist, Greg attended a promotional screening of Dan in Real Life.