Royal Tenenbaum (Gene Hackman), the patriarch ... as if success were just a hand's grasp ahead of him. The rest of the cast are up and down, some too much "up", one or two surprisingly "down ...

For his third effort, he and his co-writer, the actor Owen Wilson, have managed to assemble a cast of stars to rival ... adults' troubles is Dad, Mr Royal Tenenbaum himself (Gene Hackman), who ...