Short Takes

Movies: The Skeleton Twins, Obvious Child, Enemy, Sleeping Beauty, Going Clear

To paraphrase John Oliver on Last Week Tonight: just time for a quick recap of these movies I've seen recently

The Skeleton Twins

As far as I'm concerned, low-key dramedy The Skeleton Twins serves one major purpose: to highlight Bill Hader's gifts as an actor. Between his role here as depressed, gay, 30-something Milo and his role as the romantic lead in Trainwreck, Hader is killing it in his post-Saturday Night Live career.


As Milo attempts suicide in the opening scene, his estranged twin sister Maggie (Kristen Wiig, not very impressive in this role) is also contemplating suicide miles away. As she stares down at a handful of pills, she's get a phone call informing her that her brother is in the hospital. The twins are thrown back into each others' lives and gradually realize that maybe a lot of their problems in life have been caused by their estrangement.

Luke Wilson costars as Maggie's extremely nice doofus of a husband, and he's great in the role, but The Skeleton Twins is ultimately Hader's show.

Grade: B

***

Obvious Child

Obvious Child isn't all that different from The Skeleton Twins in its low-key, slice-of-life plot, only where Twins begins with a suicide attempt, Child ends with an abortion. Starring comedian Jenny Slate, Obvious Child has been called the 'abortion rom-com', but that's a bit of a misnomer since the abortion doesn't play a huge role in the film--it happens at the end, almost as an afterthought, which is precisely the intention of the filmmakers; i.e. to present a woman getting an abortion as NDB.

Slate plays Donna, whose boyfriend of many years dumps her. She goes to a bar and has drunken rebound sex with a random dude named Max (like ya do) who turns out to be a really nice person who actually wants to date her. Most of the movie is Max (Jake Lacey) trying to convince Donna to go out with him. Oh, she also gets preggers from that hook-up, which complicates matter.

I liked Obvious Child a lot, but it wasn't quite as good as I had been promised by the feminist blog-o-sphere. I think they were just happy to see abortion portrayed as not an insane tragedy. And it does in fact accomplish that goal.

Grade: B



***

Enemy

Ugh. The Redbox description of director Denis Villeneuve's film Enemy calls it an "erotic thriller". I wish! Instead, this arthouse film, starring Jake Gyllenhaal (the sole reason I rented it) is an abstruse, confusing mess. Gyllenhaal plays a college professor who winds up meeting a man who looks exactly like him (also played by Gyllenhaal). He attempts to unravel the mystery: are they twins separated at birth? Two versions of the same man living in alternate universes? Beats me. We never get a straight answer and it's very annoying. This is the second film of Villeneuve's I've seen and not enjoyed (I wasn't crazy about Prisoners).

Grade: C-

***

Sleeping Beauty

This ain't your grandmother's fairy tale. Sleeping Beauty (2011) stars waifish Emily Browning as cash-strapped college student Lucy who takes a job providing erotic companionship to rich, old men. No, she's not a prostitute--she never has sex with these men. Instead, Lucy allows herself to be drugged into a deep sleep and then put into a bed where these old pervs can come in and do almost anything they want to except penetrate her or leave marks.

The film, directed by author Julia Leigh is very beautiful, but only "erotic" in the way films like Belle de Jour and Eyes Wide Shut are. That is to say, not at all. There's no heat, only chill. One assumes that there's a deeper point the director is trying to make here--perhaps that men prefer women young, beautiful, and comatose--but when the movie is over you may scratch your head and say "what was the point?"

Grade: B-

***

Going Clear: Scientology and the Prison of Belief

Directed by Alex Gibney and based on the thoroughly researched book by Lawrence Wring, Going Clear takes a deep dive into Scientology: what it is, what its followers believe, how it started, and what convinces people to stay in it. Gibney and Wright take a firm stance against Scientology, particularly for its abusive tactics (especially towards "Sea Org", aka the closest thing Scientology has to a clergy) and extreme wealth hoarding (since it's technically a "religion", Scientology churches are tax exempt).

The best part of Going Clear are the candid interviews with former members, such as director Paul Haggis. Their willingness to be forthright to the point of admitting that they were sucked into a cult gives the film both its emotional heart (Haggis left in part because Scientology is still pretty anti-gay and he has two gay daughters) and its credibility.

Beware: watching Going Clear will make you question your own religion, political, and social beliefs in that you'll start to see group think patterns (in less extreme forms than in Scientology) everywhere.

Grade: A

Underage Boinking

Movies: The Diary of a Teenage Girl

I had sex today. Holy shit.

So begins the magical, confrontational, uncomfortable film The Diary of a Teenage Girl. Based on the graphic novel by Phoebe Gloeckner, who also wrote the screenplay, Diary is a funny and unflinching glimpse into the mind of 15 year old Minnie Goetze (Bel Powley) who is equal parts horny, emotional, and whip smart. Growing up in 1976 San Francisco and being raised by a single mom who is *really* into partying (Kristen Wiig), Minnie has ample opportunity to explore her sexuality and her interest in comics and art...but she chooses to explore the former with Mom's 35 year old boyfriend, Monroe (Alexander Skarsgaard).

This is where Diary presents a challenge: Minnie's coming of age (which includes more than her sexual awakening, btw) is shown primarily through the lens of her ongoing sexual relationship with a man 20 years her senior. The filmmakers handle this relationship in the most balanced, honest way possible: they make it clear that it is as consensual as possible, with Minnie excited by sex with Monroe, but they also make it clear how manipulative and unequal it is, with Monroe turning his own guilt back on Minnie, saying that she's manipulating him. The filmmakers never excuse Monroe's actions or suggest that because Minnie has fully developed secondary sex characteristics she's not really a child. By examining Minnie's inner-world, which is much like an other 15 year old's--she makes many poorly thought out choices, but also has moments of wisdom and is often sharper and more clear-eyed than the adults around her--the film encourage us to understand and empathize with her relationship with Monroe while not thinking that it's totally ok.

Let me first say that the acting is incredible in The Diary of a Teenage Girl. Bel Powley, who is 23, plays the 15 year old Minnie as a girl who is becoming aware of her own power in the world. Her physical features are striking: a curtain of long, black hair; huge eyes; a lovely figure--and the film lingers on her body in a way that doesn't feel exploitative (perhaps because there is a female director behind the camera?) but feels...knowing. Minnie spends some time looking at her naked breasts in the mirror and contemplating her body. She feels fat, but she also feels sexy. I'd argue that this war of emotions over how to view our bodies is something every woman (can't speak for men, sorry) is familiar with.

Alexander Skarsgaard plays Monroe perfectly--he may be 35, but he's about as emotionally mature as Minnie herself. He's basically a really cute man-baby, so it's easy to see why Minnie would like him. It takes guts to play someone who fucks an underage person, and  it takes talent to play them well--not as a total monster, but certainly not in a way that excuses his actions--so hats off to Skarsgaard. I can't really imagine anyone else in this role.

A subplot in Diary is Minnie's growing interest in comics and comic art. Living in San Francisco in the late 70's, she has opportunities to explore the world of underground comics (including sending Aline Kominsky some of her comics and getting encouragement back). The film incorporates graphic art, with scenes that fluidly move in and out of animation.

The Diary of a Teenage Girl shows a young woman exploring the boundaries of her sexuality and coming out the other side alive and better for it. This will disturb viewers who would prefer to think of teen girls as sexless and innocent. I can assure you--you're living in a dream world if you believe that. When I was 15, I was the ultimate "good girl"--no drinking, no drugs, and certainly no sex. But sex took up about 75% of my brain space. Like Minnie, I was both intellectually precocious and emotionally all over the place. That's the thing about 15 year olds that can be disturbing to adults: we might *look* like we're ready for the shit the world throws at us, but our brains haven't yet caught up to our bodies. The Diary of a Teenage Girl captures this paradox: humans at the peak of hormones and sexual desire who are still a little too young and inexperienced to know the full consequences of their actions. But instead of condemning or belittling the awakening a 15 year old girl might go through, Diary treats it as important and meaningful.

Grade: A