After screening this recently, the couple seated behind us ventured to admit their complete bafflement as to the meaning of the film and actually asked me to explain it. This, plus the film's clear opacity, makes me wonder if there aren't many others who would also benefit from an explanation.
Ostensibly a relationship film, the topic of Sarah Polley's writing and directorial effort is actually rather different. At the outset we are with the Michelle Williams character as she meets the Luke Kirby character in a series of kooky circumstances and conversations. Credit is deserved for the imagination shown in dreaming up these sequences, but the dialog often rings false. As just one example, do men that you know, especially Canadian men, call a woman they've just met "asshole" in a friendly way?
Eventually we discover that despite her flirtations, the Michelle Williams character is married to Seth Rogen's character, a cookery writer. The Williams character herself is an aspiring writer, but never once does she write. As the husband works from home, they see far too much of one another, having nothing to say avoid conversation and are reduced to baby talk and adolescent taunts and pranks as a means of relating. Probably the idea here is to make the audience feel the relationship ennui, but unfortunately it goes on far too long; the temptation to walk out on the film was strong.
Some comic relief, but not nearly enough, is provided from time to time, by a refreshing Sarah Silverman, playing an alcoholic. There is also a rather amusing sequence set at a swimming pool exercise led by an over-the-top gay instructor. Following that comes a shower scene including full frontal nudity for Williams, Silverman and several obese women. These scenes have no purpose, unless someone lacked sufficient confidence in the film and hoped to use them to bring in more male audience members.
Following are more desultory scenes as the Williams and Kirby character grow ever closer. These are shot in a bohemian quarter of Toronto which is fun to see, especially if one knows the area. Eventually of course there is a climactic point at which Williams must decide which relationship she wants. Along the way here are scenes where the Rogen and Kirby characters have uneasy meetings. In a bold move the film does not show the scene in which the Williams character reveals her true feelings to her husband. Because we have all seen that scene too many times before it was probably the right move, but in this there was probably strategy relating to the true meaning of the film too.
Now we see Williams and Kirby working out their new life. Instead of being told conventionally, instead we're given a montage of very short shots. We see that whereas the previous relationship was about the baby talk and adolescent behavior, this one is all about sex, until, of course, as escalating sexual situations must, it ends and the couple is left with a boring existence leavened only by a couch and a television. At this point the Williams character encounters reminders of her ex-husband, via random event comes back into contact and even appears ready to return to him.
It's at this point that an off-the-wagon Silverman character tells the truth of the film. She is an alcoholic, yes, looking for answers to life's pain in a bottle. But is the Williams character any different? Instead of doing something with her life, whether writing or anything else, she looks not in a bottle but into relationships with men, hoping to find there some answer which is never going to come. In the meantime she leaves behind her a string of broken hearts belonging to well-meaning, but somewhat naive guys who have failed to recognize her psychological dynamic.
There are some very good performances here, especially from Williams, but really all of the cast do excellent work. It's particularly amazing that Williams can segue from Marilyn Monroe to this character and make both so believable, though in a way, this character may share something with Monroe's many broken relationships.
There are incongruities as well though. It's not clear how the underemployed Williams and Kirby characters manage to support themselves financially. It's also unclear why the handsome and smart Kirby does not find an unattached woman other than Williams, even at the very party that occurs midway through. It's also puzzling that the Kirby character seems at first so smart and intuitive about who the Williams character is, but nevertheless fails to fully understand her. Either this character does have that much EQ or he doesn't; real life won't allow both ways.
As a film idea, this is not a bad one. But it could have been told much more economically. By no means should such a simple idea require 116 minutes. Many scenes should have been cut and those which remained needed more punch, more payoff. In the early going the dialog should have been more believable as well. This is a slice-of-movie in which "you are there"; unfortunately we end up being there far too long.
18 out of 25 found this helpful.
Was this review helpful? Sign in to vote.
Permalink
Tell Your Friends