The Kids Are All Right
The California that we get in this film is a greener, gayer update of the California that Woody Allen took such perfect potshots at, more than thirty years ago, in “Annie Hall,” the difference being that Cholodenko doesn’t always know that it is funny. … [D]o the screenwriters not realize that half of the women’s conversation — “We just talked conceptually,” “It hasn’t risen to the point of consciousness for you,” “It’s so indigenous!” — is pure, extra-planetary prattling and nothing but?
Anthony Lane, “Wives’ Tales,” New Yorker July 12 & 19 2010, 92.
Uh, yeah, I think they do realize that, Mr. Lane. If anything, I think The Kids Are All Right‘s script relies a little too heavily on sending up that post-hippie careful vagueness, Jules’s in particular — we all know people like that, but even people like that aren’t People Like That every minute.
The movie isn’t perfect; it has its on-the-nose moments, and the ending is sweet in its way but also feels like a compromise, like the script wanted to do something more challenging and equivocal and couldn’t quite get there. But it should be given credit for knowing its own humor.
Lane goes on to sniff that “[t]he prattle turns chronic when Jules, who fancies herself as a landscape designer, is hired by Paul to reshape his back yard; she suggests ‘a trellisy, hidden garden kind of thing,’ or, alternatively, ‘you could go with the Asiany.’ I wouldn’t trust her to pick a rose.” Right; that’s…the point. Or the point is that we would trust her to pick a rose, in the sense of cutting it, but for Jules to pick a rose in the sense of selecting one from the available options? Yes, that would take her 20 minutes to do, and she would accompany it with several watery masters-seminar paragraphs. That’s the character. That’s all the characters: frustrating, and also warm, passive-aggressive, goofy, controlling, hypocritical, high, and/or lost.
It’s a tribute to the construction of Nic and Jules specifically that I felt tenderly towards them when ordinarily I can barely tolerate the actresses playing them. Julianne Moore is a good actress, and my historical attitude towards her (in short: “uch”) isn’t rational, but I started hating her when she played Dr. Nose E. Bitchface in The Fugitive, and she might have turned it around after that, but after The Myth of Fingerprints, a hateful film in which Moore plays the most hateful in a sizeable group of hateful characters who themselves hate 1) each other, 2) wearing the correct size of sweater, and 3) organic dialogue, I lost hope. She’s very pretty and she’s very skilled and yet this is the first time in over a decade that I didn’t want to slap her every minute she was onscreen.
I don’t hate Bening, but she’s overpraised for performances that are merely good and sometimes even one-note. The ability is there, but I wonder when we all agreed to behave as though she’s one of the great talents of her generation…when she married Beatty, I assume, which is another essay, and when you marry a notorious cocksman, respected artist, and big-time industry player all in one, I don’t know that the direction you do or don’t receive subsequently is something you can control. That said, I’ve seldom felt like I’ve seen what she could really do. American Beauty is a good example; I strongly disliked the movie while respecting several of the performances, hers included, but she could have pushed harder. She’s good, but not brave.
Here, Bening is styled and lit in a way that shows every peak and gully in her face; it makes her more beautiful than the porcelain presentation of 15 years ago — and she’s finally showing us what she can really do. Maybe it’s the part, maybe it’s the direction, maybe it’s something wholly else that let her cut it loose. Maybe using a face that looks properly lived in gives her permission to put that into the acting. Whatever it is, she’s throttled down from movie star to actress, and she’s great in TKAAR, contradictory, subtle, real. Moore is great too, and Jules does some hatefully careless things, but I still rooted for her and understood her. The Academy had better remember that hideous, note-perfect scene with the straight couple at the restaurant come nominations time…and Bening singing Joni, which was some of the best acting she’s ever done and excruciating to watch.
I laughed at these characters, and with them too; the movie definitely knows the difference and plays each one accordingly, and I kind of don’t get how Lane didn’t see that. If you think it’s a minor picture, fine, just say so; it is, but not for that reason.
Tags: Annette Bening Anthony Lane Joni Mitchell Julianne Moore movies shut up inattentive criticism Warren Beatty
Re: American Beauty
Dead on how I’ve always felt about it. I disliked it with a passion but thought the performances were good.
I haven’t seen TKAAR yet but it’s on my list.
Talking to a gay couple last week, I was rattling off the list of movies I still had to see and got to this one, and they interrupted me with:
“Oh god… I couldn’t stand that movie! It made me so mad!”
And went on some vague rant trying not to ruin the plot (although unfortunately I do live in an age of RSS readers where the plot has been fairly ruined for me already), so I said “Ok, so I’ll skip that one.”
And they looked at me, stunned, and said “NO! You’ve got to see it! It’s so good!”
(Spoilery stuff in this comment, skip if you haven’t seen it yet!)
Omg that scene with the singing. I wanted it to be over SO much and yet I couldn’t look away. Also, her tense wine-drinking as she zones out and mulls over the realization of what is happening at the dinner table is right up there with Emma Thompson’s similar scene (which was also set to Joni Mitchell, who must be the patron saint of cinematic jilted wives everywhere) in Love Actually, in terms of “utterly wrenching”.
Did you have any commentary, Sars, on some of the criticism from the lesbian community? After viewing the film I totally understood where they were coming from (particularly that Jules does incredibly drawn out and graphic sex scenes with the MALE character, but the brief sex they show with her wife is fully clothed and played for laughs, with the gay porn and the vibrator buzzing). But I also totally got what the film was doing in terms of the (forgive the cliche) motivation of the character as she was making the terrible mistake. I left not knowing where I came down on it.
Aw. Perhaps my admiration for Moore (in a word: Yay!) is as rational as your distaste, but I think she is brave in a way that Bening never is – or almost never. (I’m with you on The Myth Of Fingerprints, though. What a bunch!) I hadn’t been anxious to see this one, because the other reviews I’ve read hit that “minor picture” chord pretty insistently. Now I want to see it. Thanks.
I liked Bening in her pre-Beatty stuff, i.e. The Grifters and Valmont, back when she needed the work and worked accordingly.
And as much as I think JMo would be a hoot to hang with, I usually count her presence in a cast list as a hint to avoid the flick. Her dramatic work way too often strikes me as actor’s-workshop self-indulgent, and it makes my teeth itch. Of the legion of things I hated about Magnolia, her snivelling perf enraged me. Her play at comedy seems to work better, though. (see: 30 Rock)
SPOILERS BELOW.
particularly that Jules does incredibly drawn out and graphic sex scenes with the MALE character, but the brief sex they show with her wife is fully clothed and played for laughs, with the gay porn and the vibrator buzzing
That annoyed me, and I don’t think either actress would have blanched had they been more graphic/less jokey with the sex between the two women, so I don’t think that was to blame…but I think part of that jokiness wasn’t so much about it being two women. It was about long-term-relationship sex. That was the point being made throughout the movie, showing the upsides and downsides of that kind of relationship and of that marriage in particular, the routines, the minor irritations and outbursts of bickering. Their shared gender was beside the point, to me.
But I am not gay, so I can “afford” to have it be beside the point. I think a big part of the objection was that Jules cheated on Nic with a man — that that narrative choice plays into a bunch of ignorant stereotypes about lesbians that that community is well tired of trying to combat, and I don’t blame them. It wouldn’t be my initial response to the material, because I think Jules’s reasons were a lot more complicated than just “yay, penis”; this isn’t just any man, it’s the bio father of their children together, and there’s also major control issues in that relationship…I could go on. So I think that that reaction is understandable in terms of being fed up with the culture acting like all you need is a deep dicking, but 1) that’s not the position the movie took, and 2) gay women do have affairs with/leave each other for men sometimes, and the script could pretend that that never happens in the interest of not offending anyone — or it can tell the story it wants to tell.
And it chose well, IMHO. I mean, I whapped a hand to my forehead all “nooooo, don’t fuck him, not HIM,” but not because I felt it was selling out the queer experience. I just thought it was a bad idea for those particular characters.
I’ve been solidly in the “shut up, Anthony Lane” camp since his review of Baby Mama (of all things), where he Could Not Stop calling Tina Fey fat.
“I think part of that jokiness wasn’t so much about it being two women. It was about long-term-relationship sex. That was the point being made throughout the movie, showing the upsides and downsides of that kind of relationship and of that marriage in particular, the routines, the minor irritations and outbursts of bickering.”
Yeah, I think that was the central theme. When confronted, Jules said she needed to feel appreciated, and that it wasn’t about “being straight now.” When Paul says they should be together, Jules responds that she’s gay and hangs up on him. I’m straight, have never had or wanted to have any same-sex experiences, but I believe sexuality is pretty fluid (no pun intended), so I didn’t have a hard time buying that Jules would sleep with Paul. Some family friends are a lesbian couple that’s probably a bit older than Nic and Jules (two kids, two sperm donors no one has ever met, one is a doctor, even!) and while they loathed Chasing Amy because they thought it DID have an “all lesbians need is a deep dicking” moral (I babysat their kids the night they went to see it and they came back really angry), they didn’t feel that way about TKAAR. It was about “is this all there is?” For Jules, the “it” was about the minutia that goes into being married, realizing that you trade the rush of new romance for the stability of longevity. (Also maybe feeling insecure about being unfocused, and liking that Paul thought it was cool.) For Paul, I think the “it” was about JUST having the casual, no-strings sex – exciting, but he saw the closeness of the family and wondered if he’d made the right choice in not having one.
I really wanted to know why that kid’s name was Laser. And did anyone else recognize Yaya from America’s Next Top Model? (Shut up. I don’t even watch it anymore, Tyra got to be too much.) She was Paul’s fuckbuddy, the hostess at his restaurant.
Responding to spoilers: stop reading if you haven’t seen it.
I felt EXACTLY the same way about the affair. I was all “nooooooo” from the characters’ standpoint (I think I actually said “ugh” when Paul professed to love her), and yet it made a lot of sense in the movie, and worked for me. I kind of left the theater wishing filmmakers could create a depiction of lived-in marriages where no one is cheating on anyone, but that’s not so much a criticism of this film as it is of the limited plot points that are generally considered viable dramatic conflicts for couples.
Also, I thought Annette Bening was perfect.
*Spoilers!*
The only parts of the film I wish they had trimmed were with the daughter doing her little drunky rebellious speech, because I felt like it was kinda stuck on there to “remind” us that The Kids Are People And Have Feelings Too. Same goes for the son and his toolish freind. I understand why the scenes were there, and they were well performed, but they just felt extraneous. The kids were the catalyst, all right, but the story is really about the marriage.
I really loved Ruffalo’s performance as that guy who infuriates all parents, because they’ve spent all this time telling their kids to study and work hard, that things don’t just come your way, and Ruffalo is that guy who has had things come his way his entire life. He’s not homeless or underemployed, he’s got a successful, eco-concious business, women too beautiful to exist on earth and half his age are competing for his laid-back attentions, and even the kids he just kinda “whatevered” into the world are wonderful! He’s never had to work for anything good, or rather, the work is not an effort, not unrewarding or a toll or dues to be paid for some future state where you get to do what you want. Up until he meets Jules and really falls for her, he’s never wanted anything he couldn’t have.
Goodness, I hadn’t realised I hated Julianne Moore until you wrote that, but you’re right. A bit like Bening and “agreeing to behave as though she’s one of the greatest talents of her generation”, you just take it as read that she’s a talent, but no I don’t enjoy watching her.
I thought perhaps she was so terrible in that stupid Hannibal movie just because Clarice Starling is so quintessentially Jodie Forster, but now that I think about it I haven’t enjoyed watching her in anything since Boogie Nights and since I last watched that at the cinema, who even knows if that still holds up. Plus I found her accent so distracting in 30 Rock, it took me out of the show.
While I liked the movie more than Lane did (I used to like him a lot, but feel he’s lost his touch somewhat this decade. To be fair, he does like Chodolenko as a director – he liked Laurel Canyon, her previous film), I do admit he has a point in how the movie casts Ruffalo off at the end. While you could argue this is how the interloper in a regular family would be handled – after all, the point of the movie is this is, for all intents and purposes, a regular family that happens to have gay parents – and having Bening freeze him out like that felt entirely right, I do think he’s not entirely irredeemable (I read somewhere the original script wasn’t that harsh towards him, but I don’t remember how).
I like Bening (and Moore) more than you, but I agree this is a terrific, vanity-free performance. Just as good, I think, is her performance this year in MOTHER AND CHILD, which isn’t quite as good a movie, but she’s playing again a brittle character, and playing it well.
SPOILER ALERT:
I agree with what you say about the sex scene between Moore and Bening, but I also think it isn’t entirely rote married sex. After all, they are doing it while watching gay male porn.
(spoilery!)
@Sars and Meegs – fully agree. I didn’t think ‘sell out’ when I watched, but I asked a friend in an LTR lesbian relationship about it afterwards. She said she was surprised that so many people were up in arms about the affair, because while they having the beginning of a point in the ‘all she needed was a penis’ outrage, the LGBT community is (should be?) all about accepting a spectrum of sexuality. And so having an affair with someone who is all up in your emotionally complicated business makes perfect sense – whether that person has a penis or not.
Aside from the overwhelming Berkeley-ness (which yes, that was the point!), I was just really satisfied seeing a middle-aged lesbian couple, reasonably good looking, nice family, nice house, same conflicts we all have (money, jobs, kids, the passage of time – with the exception of the obvious cornerstone of the plot!). We all know movies are not real life, but if a few people who weren’t sure about The Gays see themselves in these characters, I think that will be a very good thing.
@ bria: … where he Could Not Stop calling Tina Fey fat.
Wha – he – I don’t … WHAT?
@ K. Lazar is a Slavic name, being a variant on Lazarus which is based on the Hebrew name Elazar. I assumed one of the moms had Slavic and/or Jewish ancestry and just spelled it differently. And yes I am a Name Meanings Geek.
(insert obligatory spoiler warning here)
I figure since the movie was co-written and directed by a lesbian that it doesn’t intend to have the same meaning as Chasing Amy, that one pissed me off and I’m not even gay. In this one it actually felt organic for the characters. Jules was feeling unappreciated and not respected by Nic and Paul genuinely liked her and didn’t condescend to her like Nic did. The fact that Jules completely shut him down at the end testifies to that.
It did kind of bother me that Paul was just thrown off like that. I’m not saying they had to forgive him or talk to him or anything, I just wanted another scene with him. He fucked up badly and I’dve liked to see him dealing with his guilt.
Just a big smiley face here for Mark Ruffalo! I was starting to worry he would never get another role anywhere near as good as You Can Count On Me. This one is right in his wheelhouse and he hits it out of the park. Have to admit I liked his performance so much that I was pissed about how he was treated at the end. I mean surely he isn’t locked out forever?
This is going to be a little spoilery
While I can see where the “dick solves everything” camp is coming from I think the argument doesn’t pan out because the dick didn’t solve anything. It made things worse, dangerously worse (as do a lot of affairs, no matter what body parts are used in the commission of them). Whatever the solution turns out to be will come later, after the hopeful, but not definitive, ending.
In a similar vein I also felt that Ruffalo’s character was redeemable but that it was entirely right for an intact family that had been hurt this way to cast him off. He’s going to have to be redeemed elsewhere and that’s what his character learned. He probably wouldn’t have learned it if they let him back in for even one scene. Given the way the story pans out I can see him actually managing to approach relationships differently and perhaps changing his idea of what he wants out of life permanently, not just for the length of time he’s deep dicking a lesbian.
Very glad to read your reaction to Lane, because I had a feeling he was missing the point in exactly that way when I read those parts, but not having seen the movie I couldn’t be sure. Sometimes Anthony Lane is genuinely very funny. Other times he has nothing funny to say but he strains for it anyway. Those times are the worst because he not only goes for the awkward joke-that-doesn’t-work; he also ends up saying something not-accurate in order to say something not-funny.
Anthony Lane: I *hate* that guy. After reading many of his reviews over the years, I have become convinced that he dislikes women on a visceral level. Thank you, Sars, for a well-reasoned counterpoint to Lane’s patronizing prattling.
http://archive.constantcontact.com/fs040/1102444973224/archive/1103607952003.html
nice insight. I tried to explain why the script didn’t make it and how it could have… Check out the purple print…
Late to the party but, spoilers ahead.
I loved Bening as a matriarch. That “dick up my ass” line was perfect, and so recognizable to any parent. She just nailed being the head of this family.
The kids were wonderful, and lived up to the title. Lane’s potshots at California are so predictable at this point. What no one wants to admit is that the upside of all the touchy feely talk is a pay off in emotional intelligence. When the boy stands up to his macho friend I wanted to cheer.
I just wanted to add, I too thought the direction and acting of the 2nd (or was it 3rd?) dinner party scene – the one at the sperm donor’s house at any rate – was wonderful. I’m not sure how you take something as hackneyed as the wronged spouse discovering the evidence and make it fresh, but the director did. It was all so painful and true.
I’ve never loved Moore either, but she was such a recognizable type. I’ve known so many shiftless dreamers in my life, who are lovable but not likable and who do terrible things. She really took that character to the edge of villainy, but into it.
It really annoyed me that we never found out why the boy was named Laser, when they didn’t seem overly frivolous.
Also, how Mark Ruffalo’s character kept using the phrase “Shut the front door!” instead of shut the fuck up, or just, “Shut up” or “No way”. I have never, ever heard anyone use that phrase and it never stopped being jarring. It only happened maybe three times, max, but it was really annoying.