(NOTE 1: I'm rusty.)
(NOTE 2: There aren't any big spoilers here, but if either of these films interest you, go see them before reading this anyway. Who the hell am I to tell you what to watch?)
It is to be expected that a novelist like Dave Eggers (and his wife, novelist Vendela Vida) would make his on-screen debut with a central couple in a us-against-the-world situation. Standing apart from mainstream culture is something that Eggers celebrates in both his work and his life.
What is a surprise instead is that "Away We Go," lacks the subtlety of a novelist, with the lines of “good” and “bad” not drawn, but painted on with the widest brush possible.
Burt and Verona (John Krasinski and Maya Rudolph, respectively), are a long term and committed unmarried couple, expecting a child. They've moved to Colorado to be close to Burt's parents (Verona's have passed away), hoping that they'll play the roles of doting grandparents. However, the grandparents-to-be have a surprise of their own; the couple is moving to Belgium.
Panicked and feeling uprooted, Burt and Verona set out to find a place to raise a child and friends to help. But the dysfunction is overwhelming at every stop, whether it be an ex-boss' insanity, the new hippie-dom of childhood acquaintances or the quiet desperation of college friends.
The idea of finding home when parents are out of the picture can be a tough one to put into a story. The similarly episodic "Garden State" handled such pressures in much the same way as "Away We Go," turning central characters into somewhat passive viewers of life. It's only through their eyes that we see the insanities of everyone else.
In "Away We Go," the "episodes" of the script, while sometimes funny, do little to help. While talented actors such as Allison Janney, Jim Gaffigan and Maggie Gyllenhaal breathe some life into the over-the-top characters they've been given, one can't help but think that Vida and Eggers have created 100 minutes of strawman arguments in the foils created for Burt and Verona.
There's something to creating a harmonious home for children, but Gyllenhaal's Ellen ... er ... LN forgoes reason by banning strollers and not "hiding her lovemaking" from her children. There's also something to be said for continuing to live one's life even after children enter the picture, but for Janney's Lily that means heaping abuse and profanity on supposedly non-responsive kids. The stereotypes start to tone down into "quirks" by the second half of the film, but the point is already is stark contrast by then: Parents screw up kids in multitudes of ways.
Instead, the best moments are reserved for the down times in between, with Krasinski and Rudolph traveling. The quiet intimacy between the two makes them incredibly believable as a couple; there's no need for constant displays of affection to remind the viewer that the two are dating. It's small, simple gestures instead, and both Krasinski and Rudolph excel here.
The episodic nature of the film detracts here too, though, as the emotional arcs of the characters become cloudy. Rudolph, in particular, ends up looking bi-polar at the film's conclusion, as she pulls a 180-degree turn on one of her defining qualities in the film's final ten minutes.
Ultimately, enjoying "Away We Go" will come down to identification. Viewers who sympathize and identify with the lead couple's search for home in an increasingly isolating world will find amusement and comfort in Burt and Verona's search. Those whom have either never had such troubles or never thought about them could find the couple cloyingly sweet and the other characters broadly-drawn caricatures.
Identification is not a problem in a Woody Allen comedy, if for no other reason than it's not a goal. Allen has made a living off of blowing up elements of his own persona to cartoon proportions, whether he's playing the lead role or not.
In Larry David, Allen has found an excellent stand-in for Allen's new film, "Whatever Works." The problem is what Allen gives David to work with: One of the least likable characters in the Allen oeuvre, which is quite a statement.
In the film, Boris Yellnikoff (David) is a genius who claims he was justthisclose to winning a Nobel Prize. That wasn't enough to save his marriage, though, and is one of the many injustices (real or perceived) that has led him to misanthropy as not just an attitude, but a way of life. He makes money yelling at kids under the auspice of "teaching" them how to play chess, and hangs out with three interchangeable friends (who mostly go unnamed), seemingly the only people who can humor his rants.
But love, as it is in most Allen films, becomes the equalizer, as he takes in, rejects, then marries in a pique of jealousy, an under-21 runaway, Melodie (Evan Rachel Wood). She eventually brings with her, along with energy to spare and a talent for Cajun cooking, her mother (Patricia Clarkson), father (Ed Begley Jr.) and a young actor admirer (Henry Cavill).
If it sounds like a return to the type of comedy that Allen use to excel at, it's because the script was written in the 1970s for blacklisted actor Zero Mostel to play the role of Yellnikoff. But Mostel died before the film could be made, and Allen dusted it off, with a few minor updates, for David.
The "Curb Your Enthusiasm" star does excel with Boris' misanthropy, but somewhere between Allen's words and David's portrayal, anything beyond barely-contained hatred for his fellow man is lost. The idea of a central character being unlikeable is not new, but Yellnikoff pushes that envelope to - and some will say past - the breaking point.
The movie is laugh-out-loud funny at times, especially in the early going, as Yellnikoff's misanthropy runs headstrong into Melodie's southern sweetness (and airheadedness, of course – she's not from Manhattan, and therefore is a mouth-breathing troglodyte in Allen's world). The introduction of Melodie's similarly-backward family also gets a few laughs.
But by the end of the movie, the misanthropy tires to the point of exhaustion, and one is just left with Yellnikoff's – and Allen's – shoulder-shrugging, titular philosophy. It's not enough.
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