When watching “Dan in Real Life,” it becomes clear where a lot of grumpy old men come from: family problems.

Steve Carrell plays Dan Burns, a middle-aged widower who writes a popular advice column about relationships. Raising his three daughters in the four years since his wife’s death has produced its fair share of domestic tension, as he errs on the side of over-protectiveness.

All three want to be treated their age, but Dan refuses. Jane (Alison Pill), 17, wants her father’s trust to drive, 17-year-old Cara (Brittany Robertson) wants approval for her first love, Marty (Felipe Dieppa), and the youngest, nine-year-old Lily (Marlene Lawston), wants respect. Dan, for his part, still isn’t ready to move on to the idea of including another woman in his life.

Despite the strains, Dan insists on making the trip to the coast of Rhode Island for the annual Burns family get-together, where his parents, siblings and their families bunk up together in a cabin. From the start, the family presses Dan to start dating. When sent into town by his mother (Dianne Wiest), he meets the beautiful Marie (Juliette Binoche.) After bonding for the day, Dan heads back to the cabin, only to discover, to his horror, that the girl he’s just fallen for is the current girlfriend of his brother Mitch (Dane Cook) and that she’s staying in the cabin. Cue the impossible dilemma.

“Dan in Real Life” works with a familiar set-up: confine a family or force them to spend an undue amount of time together and then strain everyone’s relationships as much as possible on the way toward eventually reaffirming family togetherness. “Meet the Parents” and “Little Miss Sunshine” both worked this formula to its full effectiveness, and even “Wedding Crashers” briefly exploited the inherent opportunities for mischief.

At times, the film seems uncertain about its relationship with these relatives. It wants to make fun of sentimentality in the mock-tragic early parting between Cara and Marty — complete with mournful hand on the glass as the car drives off — but it earnestly uses analogous stock devices later on. The film obligingly traps Dan in a shower and tosses him off the roof, and the family makes a stab at togetherness through crossword puzzles, talent shows and football games. The film knows and provides the expected essentials, but half-heartedly, somewhat sheepish at being part of a near-played-out tradition.

In that sense, the film is much like its lead performance. I’d find it hard to believe that the part wasn’t written for or at least tailored to Carrell, as the film draws on prior traits of and scenes involving his most-liked characters. There are flashes of his roles in “The 40 Year-Old Virgin,” “Little Miss Sunshine” and “The Office” in every passive gesture, hard-earned piece of wisdom and awkward comment, and he knows it. This might be the birth of the meta-Steve Carrell movie.

While he awkwardly adopts their tics and quirks, Carrell also brings from his prior characters, more than anything, an overpowering loneliness. It permeates everything he does in the movie. He makes Dan scared, hesitant and longing all at once. The way this comes across is what is great about his performance. The subtle clarity of this portrayal, though, makes for a very reserved character, and sometimes the film limps along lifelessly with its lead.

The best moments come when Dan and the film let go of their self-consciousness and go for broke. The first time the film makes you care is in the out-of-nowhere flourish of Dan’s first meeting with Marie. The bulk of the scene plays out in one long, playful take: Dan flirting with Marie, pulling random books off the shelf as she tries to describe what she’s looking for. He comes alive, smiling and laughing as he enthusiastically hops around his amused companion. The camera refuses to cut, as anxious about the success of Dan’s attempts as he is. It’s a wonderful, charming scene, and there are just enough of them throughout to make the whole project worthwhile. Later, the film improbably pulls one off through Pete Townshend’s “Let My Love Open the Door.” I can speculate dreamily as to what the movie would have been like if it had stuck to these moments of gleeful abandon throughout, but with its stock construction, these scenes stick out like gems and keep you interested until it all wraps up.

The final scenes give us a Carrell I’ve never quite seen before and an ending in which Dan cheerfully turns down the normal tidy moral in favor of more unexpected wisdom. By the end, thankfully, “Dan in Real Life,” its hero and the lead performance break free of the pressures of their relatives, without disowning them. While they take too long to struggle loose, they all try their best, finally win out and provide a lot of delight along the way. It could be just the thing for the grumpy old man in your life.෸