Time to continue with the reheated leftovers of the previous
year, consisting mainly of what wasn’t good enough to be released in 2019
(hello, Dolittle) and the remainder of the Oscar nominations that didn’t fit
the schedule, and we’re dealing with a legacy remake. I get the feeling that,
if not reading the original classic source material, I should have at least
glanced at the book’s previous adaptations. However, since there’s six
pre-existing films based on this work, one of which done by PureFlix, I don’t
particularly feel the need to overplay the story for myself under the pretence
of doing research for the new one. I want to give this its fair chance, and
after Greta Gerwig’s last success with Lady Bird, I’m more than comfortable
with letting this stand on its own. Tl;dr Don’t expect any adaptation
comparisons; this is strictly about this version on its own.
I would like to start off by extending a gracious hand to
casting directors Kathy Driscoll and Francine Maisler because I couldn’t come
up with a more perfect collection of actors if I tried. Saoirse Ronan as the
ambitious writer, Florence Pugh as the rather icy painter, Emma Watson as the
budding actress, and Aussie up-and-comer Eliza Scanlen as the loner pianist;
not only do they all fill their roles with the kind of natural breeziness that
I’ve come to expect from Gerwig’s direction, their interplay is aggressively
watchable. If the script stripped out literally everything that isn’t these
sisters chatting and arguing with each other, this film still would’ve coasted
by just fine for a little over two hours on their performances alone. Add to
that Laura Dern as their mother, Timothée Chalamet as the token
guy/revolving-door love interest, and Meryl Streep as all things depressively
spinster, and you’ve got an amazing dramatic bedrock.
Gerwig’s relationship with Noah Baumbach definitely seems to
be rubbing off on her, as she seems to be taking a page out of his book in her
depiction of a family with various artistic aspirations. The way it manifests through
the individual characters keeps things fresh throughout, but the finer points
regarding art and its effect on people certainly warmed their way to my
metatext-obsessed heart.
With Ronan’s Jo, her fiery drive to make it in a
male-dominated industry packs just the right amount of righteousness, and when
Louis Garrel’s professor critiques her work, we basically get the encapsulation
of how humourous, how frustrating and how kinda-sorta depressing it is to have
someone be bluntly honest about what they think regarding art. When you put
your heart and soul into something you care about, even the best-intentioned
criticism can feel like knives in the back.
With Pugh’s Amy, we get a Jan Brady situation, as her own
ambition not only towers over even that of Jo’s, but the reason for its stature
is down to a bit of sibling rivalry and jealousy. Add to that how her personal
frustrations with her art bring her to the point of wanting to throw it all in,
and it makes even her more callous actions still feel real (if not entirely
defensible). The green-eyed monster can make even genuine success feel
underwhelming, especially when you set your expectations only against what
everyone else should want from you.
With Watson’s Meg, the source material’s antiquity peeks through
a little bit, as she is the first to pass on her theatrical goals in place of
starting a family. It occasionally rubs against the grain of the rather
Jo-centric framing of the story overall, but it ends up revealing something
quite potent in the process. Jo’s big speech is in regards to how love
shouldn’t be all that a woman is fit for… but just because it shouldn’t take up
the entirety of one’s raison d’etre doesn’t mean it should be absent from it
altogether. Maybe one’s role to play in life needn’t be something so literal,
so long as it fills the heart with the joy it needs.
And with Scanlen’s Beth, we have a purely personal
perspective. Scanlen’s performance might actually be the best of everyone here,
purely on how much she is able to convey while technically saying the least of
the four sisters. And that, in essence, is her character: Quiet that says all
that is needed. Aside from her more tragic position in the larger story, her
sitting at the piano (and her rather cute worrying about not disturbing anyone
else in the process of playing, which I relate to so damn hard it actually
hurts a little) provides a needed insular dimension to the film’s musings about
art. Making art purely for one’s self, rather than needing to appease everyone
else, can often be the most satisfying way a person can create.
Apologies for potentially turning this into cinematic
CliffNotes, but as I’ve demonstrated in past reviews, I really am a sucker for
art that comments on the nature of art. And even beyond that, between the
almost-scorching warmth of Yorick Le Saux’s flashback visuals, the nimble way
Gerwig’s scripting handles the romantic aspects, and the stunning chemistry
between the actors, there are baskets-full of reasons to like this thing. It
may not be as stealthily emotional as Lady Bird, and there are still some
teething problems with the attempts at progressivism in this period story, but
that doesn’t make this film’s beating heart any less impactful.
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