Some ballads make your heart soar, some make it sink, and some you just want to end. Like this off-key irritant from writer-director Rebecca Miller (aka Mrs Day-Lewis) which tries to be quirky and meaningful but turns out to be as two-faced as her husband's protagonist.

As written, Jack is a sanctimonious Scottish hippy-crit, a selfish bully with a heart condition who acts one way while expecting everyone else to behave in another.

He and his daughter Rose (Belle) enjoy an idyllic, secluded life on an island off the coast of America (actually Canada's Prince Edward Island), the site of a commune where Jack and his pals tried to get back to nature back in the 60s.

It was a groovy experiment until everyone (including his wife) else left. But Jack's still living the veggie dream, smoking roll-ups and taking potshots at the builders who are getting ever closer to he and his little girl.

Jack likes experiments. His latest one is to invite his girlfriend Kathleen (Keener) and her sons - scraggly Thaddeus and tubby Rodney (a rare sympathetic character) - to come and live with them.

Rose is resentful of the intrusion and is transformed overnight from bright-and-sparky innocent to hormone-addled malcontent, desperate to lose her virginity while loosing guns and snakes inside the house.

There are incidents and accidents and Jason Lee pops up as a flowerpot man while Beau Bridges plays the nicest property developer in America.

Amid all this new-age nonsense, one character pertinently asks "Who are you people?"

Here are some other questions. If Jack is so concerned about the environment, why doesn't he get himself a horse and cart instead of a gas-guzzling truck? It's only a small island.

Also, if he's all for the peaceful life, why does he go round shooting at people instead of talking to them?

And why did the commune split up? How did Jack and Kathleen meet? How come he's never met her kids before? What's the relevance of this being set in 1986?

Miller only gives us answers when she feels like it. Like explaining away Jack's apparently comfortable financial situation by giving him a hefty inheritance. Very convenient.

The entire film wants to have its (wholegrain) cake and eat it. But Miller has another thing coming if she thinks the audience is going to be satisfied with whatever she puts in front of them.

The highest notes come at the end, which merely begs one last question: will anyone care by then?

Elliott Noble