Warren Schmidt (masterly portrayed by Jack Nicholson) is at one of those points in life in which one can look back and assess what we have done with the life we have had. I think he was surprised when he looked back and saw how empty it had been.

GREAT HUMOR
There is great humor in About Schmidt -- especially for someone, like me, who at least can see retirement on the far horizon. From an entertainment point of view, the humor in itself is worth seeing the film. But under the humor there are serious issues the film is dealing with.

About Schmidt opens with him sitting in his empty office watching the clock click the last few seconds to five o'clock on his last day before he retires. There are boxes piled up of the work he has done, but he's soon to discover that in reality, the sum of his life amounts to very little.

A ROAD FILM
A good part of the film is a road movie in which he searches for some meaning of what his life has been. Is there enough to his life for him to be able to reconnect? Before long, he discovers that he has lost everything that has defined his life: his job, his wife (and even his faith in his wife), his home (in a way), even his birthplace.

UNWORTHY PEOPLE?
Another part of the film deals with Schmidt dealing with his daughter's impending wedding. When he arrives in Denver a few days before the wedding, he discovers a family of in-laws that he feels is woefully unworthy of his own family. He tries to convince his daughter not to take this road with her life. In fact, he is really rejecting his own life.

DESPERATE TO CONNECT
About Schmidt forces us to see the world through Schmidt's eyes. Everyone he meets seems to be exaggerated, especially in their faults. Could his future son-in-law's family really be that oddball? Could the family he meets in the RV park really be that happy? Yet, as easily as he sees the faults in everyone else, he fails to see the failures of his own life. He is desperate to be connected with someone, but whenever he gets a chance, he refuses to connect. He is a lonely man who keeps getting lonelier.

LIKE A PRAYER
Throughout the film, Schmidt writes very personal letters to Ndugu, a six year old orphan he sponsors in Africa through a child rescue organization. He reveals things to Ndugu that would be uncomfortable for an adult to listen to. Ndugu becomes his confessor and confidant. In a sense, his letters to Ndugu are like a prayer to some distant, impersonal God. He wants to be heard and understood, although the things he writes are obviously beyond the child's understanding. When the answer finally comes from Ndugu, it just emphasizes the emptiness to Schmidt's life.

DESPAIR
About Schmidt is a film that focuses on despair. As Schmidt seeks some identity and meaning for his life, he falls deeper and deeper into despair. The end of the movie is somewhat open-ended. It could be interpreted as having some hope, but for me it was even more despair. By the end of the movie there is nothing left to give any joy to his life. He has searched for meaning and comes up, as his office was at the beginning, empty.

SOME HOPE
It seems this is the season for movies about despair. The Hours and Far From Heaven also deal with a great amount of despair. About Schmidt is a comic look at despair (as incongruous as that may sound). All of these may offer some small sliver of hope in the end, but each (including About Schmidt) sends the viewer out of the theater with the taste of despair still in his or her mouth.