See “What Maisie Knew” from her pint-sized point-of-view

You could create a drinking game around Scott McGehee and David Siegel’s art house flick What Maisie Knew. Based on a Henry James novel, the film centers on Maisie (Onata Aprile), a young girl whose feuding, self-involved parents (Julianne Moore and Steve Coogan) pass her back and forth like a baton. Not to make light of a tough situation, but if you could drank every time Maisie changed hands, you’d be sloshed by the film’s end.

Maisie’s mother Susanna (Moore) is a rock singer whose star is fading. And her father Beale (Coogan) is an art dealer who’s always on the phone or on the run. The two are constantly preoccupied and have hired Margo (Joanna Vanderham) to look after Maisie. Susanna and Beale also regularly argue and it’s not long before they divorce and start new relationships. Susanna begins dating Lincoln (Alexander Skarsgård), a soft-spoken bartender, and Beale hooks up with Margo. When the court orders joint custody, the already overlooked Maisie begins shuffling from one household to the next. When Susanna goes on a long tour, she passes Maisie off to Lincoln, who surprisingly takes to the child. He’s responsible for seeing it that she gets to Margo, who watches her while Beale does his art dealing. It’s not a surprise, then, when Lincoln and Margo bond over their affection for the young girl.

The film does effectively show just how tough divorce can be on a young child and how your real family may just be the people who get out of their own way to consistently care for and love you. Aprile is fantastic at playing Maisie as a girl with just enough emotional intelligence to catch on to what is going on and to protect her own interests. This is her acting debut and she puts on a tremendous performance that’s all the more remarkable because she holds her own against a high caliber cast. Everything in this film—from unseemly late-night parties to magical kites—is seen through the eyes of a child. But, while the visually provocative modernization of the James’ novel works on many ideas, the story of childlike parents who don’t understand the damage they do has been told (repeatedly since Kramer Vs. Kramer) and in the end this one somehow is just not as compelling as it might be.