Christopher Schroeder

Category: reviews

  • Needs a North Star

    Needs a North Star

    I’m surprised that I didn’t like Northern Lights (2023) more than I did.

    This streaming series, which is an adaptation of a play by Stephen Jones, tells the story of two grieving strangers Áine (Elva Trill) and Lloyd (Jones) who connect through their tragedies. Áine is standing in the rain on a bridge outside Lloyd’s apartment after his estranged girlfriend Denise (Jennifer Heylen) asked him to leave their home in the emotional aftermath of their newborn’s sudden death.

    This bridge is where Áine’s boyfriend Seán (Jay Duffy) jumped to his death. It’s also where Lloyd had spoken to him just before he jumped and where Denise previously had been talking to him, and where Lloyd saw them from his window when Denise lied about why she was late to dinner he had prepared.

    I typically like adapted plays perhaps because these stories seem more substantial. However, I thought this story, which might have worked as a two-hander tragicomic play, had been stretched too far across six episodes and almost 300 minutes, and past the point of ripping and tearing.

    I also was skeptical about the coincidences, especially in the Dublin setting. Greater Dublin, which is visually appealing, reportedly includes two million people across 2,500 miles. That though doesn’t prevent these characters from meeting on the same bridge at similar times.

    I additionally couldn’t overlook the representation of The Catcher in the Rye. This 1951 novel by J. D. Salinger, which also features a grieving narrator, gets its title from its narrator’s misunderstanding of a poem, which reinforces his inability to manage, or even recognize, the grief that alienates him from everyone, contributes to his emotional breakdown, and explains its mental health setting.

    In contrast, Áine and Lloyd and even Denise ostensibly confront their grief and reconnect with their loved ones. This contrast however is never acknowledged, and seems unclear, even though it could have contributed in more than one way to this story.

    These prevented me from connecting with this story, which might work on a stage somewhere but doesn’t do so on a smaller screen across six episodes for five hours.

  • Nowhere to Go

    Nowhere to Go

    Motor City is an unnecessary movie with little entertainment value.

    This crime drama, which was written by Chad St. John, offers a familiar story. A small-time drug dealer (Alan Ritchson) who falls in love with a more powerful dealer’s (Ben Foster) girlfriend (Shailene Woodley) is falsely imprisoned, escapes with help from his friends, and spends the lives of this girl and his friends, and the rest of his life, obtaining revenge.

    This movie, which is set in 1970s Detroit has next to no dialogue, which obviously foregrounds the acting, designing, and directing (Potsy Pocirocoli). These elements strain and crumble under the pressure.

    The most convincing performance is Woodley’s, who plays a supporting character. The leads are often comical.

    The settings sometimes evoke 1970s Detroit even though the movie was filmed in New Jersey. The problem is that this setting has little if any significance to the story unless it vaguely suggests something mechanical about the main characters.

    The costumes were conventionally cliched. The sound design, and the classic 1970s rock sound at its center, is often loud, and seemingly supposed to support the narrative although again in unclear ways.

    These limitations and others suggest questionable directing decisions. These are limited however by the predictable plot and cliched script.

    I initially wondered whether the story was just starting slowly, and soon suspected that the dialogue restriction was an intentional challenge. If so, it was more than this movie could meet, which makes it both unappealing and unnecessary.

  • An Invitation To What?

    An Invitation To What?

    The new movie The Invite, which is widely recommended, is a summer diversion, and not much more.

    Angela (Olivia Wilde) secretly invites their upstairs neighbors Pína (Penélope Cruz) and Hawk (Edward Norton), whose late-night sex has bothered both her husband Joe (Seth Rogen) and her. Their neighbors, who apologize for the noise and elaborate on its origins, ultimately help Angela and Joe realize that they need to reset their marriage or end it.

    This movie, which is a remake of a 2020 Spanish version by Cesc Gay based upon his 2015 play, has also been adapted into French, Italian, Swiss, Russian, Czech and South Korean. This version, which was written by Will McCormack and Rashida Jones and directed by Wilde, allowed Wilde to fulfill a dream about the proper way to make a movie, and also why she dedicated it to her late mentor.

    The best part I believe is the ensemble. Rogen and Norton lack the range of, and as a result are less convincing than, Cruz and Wilde, and could have been pushed for more. Nonetheless, the four manage and maintain the tension, and prevent it from escaping until the end, which is a credit to both the cast and the director and challenges a general concern about directors who direct themselves.

    The most challenging part for me was a the story, which at least in this version suffers from a narrative identity crisis and never finds its way. It starts strong, and adds potentially productive complications — how should neighbors confront each other, and how do new relationships complement or complicate longer, and more established, ones? — but never settles into a compelling conversation, which is ultimately confusing.

    This this movie a discussion of communal living or conventional marriage or love and loss? A coming-of-age-in-later-life story? A story about inevitable disappointments, including the limits of love, or even the a regular disconnect between dreams and daily life?

    The answer is likely a mix of these but as such remains messy, and thus superficial. Part of this challenge could be the effects of adaptation, translation, or both, but the resulting story seems to suffer as much from being workshopped (or focus-grouped) too much.

    I wonder about the discussion between Joe and Angela the next morning or among any of them in the elevator or lobby the next time. Such omissions I realize can be intentional, but these choices succeed when the purpose is convincing and clear.

    As a result, I’d recommend this moving as a summertime diversion, a more sophisticated one than any action blockbuster and yet little more satisfying.