Lonesome Jim

Lonesome Jim is a 2005 American comedy/drama film directed by Steve Buscemi. Filmed mostly in the city of Goshen, Indiana, the film stars Casey Affleck as a chronically depressed aspiring novelist who moves back into his parents' home after failing to make it in New York City. Liv Tyler also stars as a good-hearted nurse who finds contentment through encouraging optimism in Jim's glum world.

Lonesome Jim premiered at the 2005 Sundance Film Festival where it was nominated for the Grand Jury Prize but it lost the award to Ira Sachs' Forty Shades of Blue.

Plot

Jim (Casey Affleck) is a perennially gloomy 27-year-old aspiring novelist from Goshen, Indiana who moved to New York City in hopes of finding success with his writing. After two years of barely making a living as a dog walker, he defeatedly decides to move back home to his parents' house in Goshen.

Jim's 32 year-old brother Tim (Kevin Corrigan) is a recently divorced father of two young girls whose business recently failed. Tim has moved back into his parents' home and he works in the ladder factory that's owned and operated by their pessimistic father Don (Seymour Cassel) and overly cheerful mother Sally (Mary Kay Place). Jim has no interest in the family business and he resists pressure from Don to start working there.