Directed by Randall Miller, “Nobel Son” is a three in one drama, comedy and thriller about the relationship between father and son. The cast includes big names such as Alan Rickman, Mary Steenburgen, Bill Pullman and Danny DeVito, but it holds a promise that is never fulfilled. Other actors include Shawn Hatosy, Bryan Greenberg, Ted Danson and Tracey Walter. Randall Miller has directed other films and television shows including “Class Act,” “Houseguest,” “thirtysomething,” and “Northern Exposure.”

The movie revolves around the dysfunctional family relationships. Barkley Michaelson (played by Bryan Greenberg), an anthropology graduate student specializing in the study of cannibalism, is struggling to finish his PhD thesis when he finds that his father wins the Nobel Prize for Chemistry, an event with a great impact on the lives of Barkley and his mother. Their happiness is short and the story becomes more complex when Barkley is kidnapped and the requested ransom is the $ 2,000,000 in Nobel Prize money. Barkley’s father refuses to pay the money, Barkley conspires with his kidnapper to steal the money from his father and the family relationships go from bad to worse. The film touches on drama, bloody images and even some comedy.

The opening scene resumes the entire movie: in an atmosphere infused with techno music, Barkley quotes a 16th century French philosopher: “I think there is more barbarity in eating a man alive than in eating him dead.”

The screenplay is written by Miller and Jody Savin, who also collaborated with him on “Marilyn Hotchkiss' Ballroom Dancing & Charm School.”