WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT KEVIN

WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT KEVIN
Written by Lynne Ramsay and Rory Kinnear
Directed by Lynne Ramsay
Starring Tilda Swinton, John C. Reilley and Ezra Miller


Dr. Foulkes: He’s a floppy little boy, isn’t he? But there’s nothing wrong with him.

I know we’re supposed to talk about him but I have a very hard time talking about WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT KEVIN. (I meant to write this review three weeks ago and just couldn’t do it until now.) From the moment it opens, with a jubilant Tilda Swinton, dousing herself, the people around her and the entire screen in deep red tomatoes and their juice at the Tomatina festival, in Bunol, Spain, I was consumed by the film. The imagery and the intention were so vibrant and alive, it was almost intoxicating. And then it gets drab and ugly and we are thrown into a world where every trace of Swinton’s former life is absent. All that remains is a run down shack on what is clearly the wrong side of town. The red is still there but now its the painted curse words on the front of her home. How did her life go from one extreme to the other? She had Kevin.

Swinton is mind blowing in Lynne Ramsay’s brilliant adaptation of Lionel Shriver’s popular novel. She plays Eva Katchadourian. Once upon a time she was a successful travel agent who would travel to the most exotic of locations with her happy husband, Franklin (John C. Reilley). Like most people, her life changed when she had a baby. Before long, she and her family were leaving New York City for a quiet place in the suburbs, as they do. Eva struggled though to find happiness in her new life. She never seemed to connect with her son, Kevin (played primarily as an adult on screen by the disturbingly lanky, Ezra Miller), and began to fear there was something wrong with him. It doesn’t take too long though before she starts to suspect that Kevin is just being spiteful and directing some fairly disturbing anger solely at her. It gets so callous she can hardly seem to get the words out at some point. She loves him but she also hates him simultaneously. It’s as if she knows she is obligated to love him but cannot for the life of her figure out how to accomplish this. And for as much direct suggestion the title provides, no one ever seems to talk too much about Kevin, when clearly they should.

Ramsay slowly reveals to us in flashback how Eva fell from grace and WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT KEVIN becomes a modern telling of a familiar horror story. Personally, I find it quite refreshing to see a film about an evil child that isn’t possessed by some spirit or satanic force. Kevin has done something truly horrible but we don’t know what that is, just what it did to Eva’s life and that she never abandoned him despite any of it. The back and forth in time and space, which I loved being lost in, makes it near impossible to situate yourself directly in the narrative for too long at any one time, likely very similar to the blur of Eva’s fractured mind. To piece the puzzle together means having to ask whether or not Kevin’s troubles came from his mother or perhaps whether Kevin is just plain evil. It’s nature vs. nurture but it forces us to acknowledge that if we side with nature, we must not only admit that some apples really are just bad but also remember the trees they fell not too far from.

PS. If you or anyone you know is thinking about having children, you might seriously consider seeing this first (or not).

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CARNAGE

CARNAGE 
Written by Yasmina Reza and Roman Polanski
Directed by Roman Polanski
Starring Jodie Foster, Kate Winslet, Christoph Waltz and John C. Reilly

Penelope Longstreet: Why can’t things be easier? Why does everything have to be so exhausting?

There are some plays that seem as though they could never be adapted for the screen and Yasmina Reza’s “God of Carnage” is certainly one of them. Although I have not myself seen it on stage, I can imagine its physical scope is quite limited as all the action takes place in one apartment over the course of a few hours. On stage, this can be riveting, as long as the conversation itself is sharp and insightful and as long as those partaking in said conversation give brilliant performances. On film, one location with the same four characters can be a static stand still. Fortunately for Reza, all involved in the film adaptation of her play, now called CARNAGE, are precisely the right people to keep things moving.

At the CARNAGE helm is infamous director, Roman Polanski, a man who has seen his own fair share of carnage in his life. Reza herself collaborated with Polanski on the screenplay so the fundamentals are firmly intact. Essentially, two couples meet to discuss an altercation that took place between their boys in a playground that resulted in one of the boys losing teeth. Things naturally don’t go as well as anyone had hoped. And who does Polanski amass to captivate us with their wit and humour? Four brilliant actors of course as the entire acting community seem to clamor to work with him. Jodie Foster and John C. Reilly play parents to the boy who lost his teeth while Kate Winslet and Christoph Waltz play parents to the boy who was armed with the stick - sorry, who was carrying the stick - that knocked out the teeth. I don’t know about you but I can think of way worse people to be stuck in a room with for ninety minutes.

These two couples, as portrayed by this amazingly talented and dynamic cast, start out as sensible, civilized adults who are doing what they all think is right according to societal standards given the situation at hand. After all, what matters most is the well being of their children and ensuring that they come out of this as positively as possible. It’s the fact that the children are involved though that makes their exercise so futile to begin with. Their children were in a fight and hurt each other. The natural impulse for these parents would be to protect their children no matter what. And so it is not at all surprising to watch as their facades slowly but surely fade away to reveal not only their anger over the current situation but also the deep seeded disgust that has been festering in all of them for as long as they’ve had to hold it in. And given how polite our Western society can be at times, I’d say they’ve been holding back for a very long time.

Polanski does everything he must in order to keep a picture that almost never leaves the living room feel like it is in constant motion. Much of that comes from the rapid unravelling of the characters themselves. Their descent is delicious making CARNAGE a truly stimulating experience. Still, I imagine that if these four people exhibited just as much passion on stage, the immediacy of it would make their madness that much more meaningful.

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CYRUS

Written and Directed by Mark Duplass and Jay Duplass

Starring John C. Reilly, Jonah Hill, Marisa Tomei and Catherine Keener

John: I know you’re not supposed to say this but I really like you.  Is it crazy for me to say I want it to work out?

Love is tricky to figure out, to piece together so that it actually works out for all parties involved.  Love is particularly tricky when you’re middle-aged, have been single for seven years, you’re not really so impressive on paper or in person and the object of your affections is in something of an unhealthy relationship with her 22-year-old-son.  Yes, this is what makes love tricky in our modern existence but it is also what makes love oh so rewarding if you manage to get through it.  Furthermore, in this particular case, it makes for the perfect comedic setup for the new Duplass brothers comedy, CYRUS, the summer’s first great indie-comedy.

John C. Reilly makes a fine return to the screen in a more complex, character-based role than he has played in recent memory.  John, which is his name in the film and not a casual form of address for the actor, is seven years divorced and still hanging on to that relationship.  As a result, he doesn’t do much outside of the house and dating is about as foreign a concept to him as a single sit-up must be given the state of his physique.  Without wasting any time on showing us scene after scene to prove what a lonely loser John really is, writers/directors, Mark Duplass and Jay Duplass, introduce John to Molly (Marisa Tomei) at a party his soon-to-be-remarried ex-wife (Catherine Keener) drags him to.  They hit it off instantly which begs the question, what’s wrong with this girl?

As it turns out, she is quite lovely and she and John fall for each just like that.  Just because she’s lovely though doesn’t mean she isn’t hiding plenty of ugly behind your back.  The ugly I’m talking about here is Jonah Hill.  I’m kidding; the actual ugly is the unhealthily close relationship she has with her son, Cyrus, played by the also lovely, Hill.  Seriously, I actually think he’s hilarious.  I’m not sure I wanted to see Hill or Reilly in so many high definition close-ups but it does help you see that they are not so dissimilar.  This might be one good explanation why Cyrus makes it his personal mission to ensure John and Molly do not succeed as a couple despite the fact that they are both so much happier now that they’ve met.

The beauty of CYRUS, and there is a lot of it, is the natural way in which the Duplass brothers bring everything together perfectly.  A sharp, subtle script, in which Cyrus and John battle intelligently instead of declaring war on each other in some farcical sense, is embodied seamlessly by a pitch perfect cast.  Safe for a fairly conventional conclusion, the Dulplass brothers prove that real situations can be shown for the difficult messes they are and still be incredibly funny at the same time.

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