It’s a life chapter most of us will face at some point: when old age reverses the roles of parent and child, guardian and ward. Wendy and Jon Savage (Laura Linney and Philip Seymour Hoffman) are plunged into this chapter when a home assistance agency rings to tell them their father Lenny (Philip Bosco) has smeared faecal matter across the bathroom wall.

They fly from New York to Arizona to try and decide what to do with Dad, only to find his live-in girlfriend has kicked the bucket – and due to a variation on a pre-nuptial agreement, Dad has nowhere to live. Wendy is not thrilled with the idea of putting her father in a nursing home, but as the seemingly practical Jon points out, they’re both too absorbed in their own lives to play caregiver to a diagnosed dementia patient.

So they take Lenny back to New York and put him in a nursing home ten minutes down the road from Jon’s apartment. It will allow them to resume what they think is most important – Wendy is an aspiring playwright and Jon is an academic trying to publish a book. But in confronting the unpleasant realities of their father’s illness and his inevitable demise, the siblings are also forced to confront their own far-from-perfect lives.

It sounds like the sort of thematic onanism in which Noam Baumbach tends to engage, but The Savages writer/director Tamara Jenkins understands any deeper message needs to be delivered via a compelling narrative – and this one holds you till the final minute. Her direction in particular is just exquisite, a two-hour film school in pacing, timing and meaningful shot selection.

It’s also a joy to see two such consummate performers as Hoffman and Linney bouncing off one another and making the screenplay’s delicate mix of emotion and understated comedy seem easy. They’re also totally believable as brother and sister, even though they look and sound nothing alike – impressive.

While it can sometimes gloss over the true horrors of a deteriorative condition like dementia, The Savages is otherwise an honest portrayal of how people cope with family tragedy in this modern world, where ambition and success too often take precedence over love and loyalty.