Filmmaker Noah Baumbach and actors Dustin Hoffman, Ben Stiller and Adam Sandler channel links of all kinds into 'Meyerowitz Stories'

The dynamics of family, the connections that do and do not bind people together, have long been a preoccupation for filmmaker Noah Baumbach. After exploring them in films such as "The Squid and the Whale," "Margot at the Wedding," "While We're Young" and "Mistress America," Baumbach pushes further into the unknown territories of someone else's family in his latest, "The Meyerowitz Stories (New and Selected)."

And making the movie brought together an unusual family of its own. The project marks the third collaboration between Baumbach and leading man Ben Stiller, who costars with Adam Sandler. Stiller and Sandler have known each other for many years and had long looked for a project they could do together.

"The Meyerowitz Stories" began after a few conversations among the three men, in which it was decided that the actors should play brothers and that there should be a