Jason Reitman

  • Young Adult (2011)

    Young Adult (2011)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On Cable TV, February 2020) When we get around to Charlize Theron’s career retrospective, I suspect that most will be gobsmacked by the sheer range of performances, roles and physical transformation that she has kept up throughout her career. Rather than coast along on classic beauty roles (which she could have done), Theron has played glamorous, homely, tough, fast, furious, comic, tragic and whatever comes in-between, often jumping from one role to a very different one in an entirely different genre. Films like Young Adult are further evidence of her range, as she takes on a somewhat repellent character; a woman in her thirties who still thinks and behaves like an overgrown teenager, and whose trip back to her small hometown doesn’t necessarily translate into personal growth—not that she was heading back for noble reasons either. Physically, Theron’s character is attractive, but her personality is the issue and the film does cleverly play with that distinction. Although, with Cody Diablo writing the script and Jason Reitman directing, we could have expected that. (Patton Oswalt also turns in an effective polar-opposite performance.) A fairly intense drama under the occasional guise of a silly comedy, Young Adult doesn’t bring us anywhere comfortable or inspiring: the conclusion does not force easy epiphanies on a character who refuses to have any. It’s quite good at sketching small-scale character studies and upending expectations at least half the time. While the result certainly won’t qualify for any feel-good awards, Young Adult is a well-handled drama with some surprisingly funny moments in-between the protagonist’s destructive cluelessness. It’s significantly more interesting than even the best plot summary would suggest.

  • The Front Runner (2018)

    The Front Runner (2018)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, June 2019) As a political junkie, I’m a natural audience for the kind of political docufiction such as The Front Runner—which joins the slew of HBO political movies, and similar titles such as Shock and Awe. But let’s be careful—The Front Runner is a dissection of the Gary Hart adultery scandal of 1988 without much of a political axe to grind, except for looking at the inner workings of a campaign in crisis mode, as a sympathetic candidate is ultimately brought down by an affair. The good news is that the film can boast of an impressive cast (an older Hugh Jackman, and fine character work by Vera Farmiga and J. K. Simmons), a competent director (Jason Reitman, keeping the mayhem moving at an understandable pace) and some good production values taking us back to 1988. There are a few good moments despite the story being chronologically rearranged for impact and a few crucial details (such as Hart’s comeback campaign a few months later) being left unmentioned. But The Front Runner does have issues. In having to follow facts, it does run out of narrative steam in its last act as the candidate can’t quite grasp the trouble he’s in, and all that’s left after the mid-movie confrontations and investigative work are the recriminations and the throwing of the towel. Perhaps more problematic is the film’s thematic development—considering that much of the last act is a back-and-forth between a sympathetic candidate and a combative media, it’s a natural occasion to examine questions of ethics, monogamy, or whether personal issues affect leadership. Alas, that’s when the film turns ambivalent, neither arguing forcefully for a position nor making points that would be relevant to a contemporary audience. (Considering a current administration that’s so stained with overlapping scandals that none of them seem to stick, there would have been a golden opportunity here to make relevant parallels.)  The Front Runner ends up feeling non-committed, muddled, anticlimactic. As a political junkie, I still like it… but there was a better movie here trying to get out—even if it does get some recognition for not straying too far away from the facts.

  • Tully (2018)

    Tully (2018)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, January 2019) As a parent who just got out of the first few tough years, there’s an innate relatability to Tully’s phantasmagorical premise that rings true—given the sleep deprivation during a baby’s first years, I’m not sure that any parent is actually totally sane during that period and this film runs with the premise. Charlize Theron adds another impressive notch to her multidimensional screen persona by playing an overworked, super-stressed mother of three, with Mackenzie Davis in a strong supporting role and Ron Livingston to tie the narrative threads together. As a portrait of parenthood, Tully is more ruthlessly honest than most other movies—there’s little idealization going on here, and we’re miles away from shiny mommy blogging. There’s a nice balance between domestic details and frustration and the more outlandish flights of fancy that the story requires. Reuniting with scribe Diablo Cody (herself a mother of three), director Jason Reitman doesn’t try to recapture Juno’s motormouth wit but wisely stays grounded given the third-act twists. Going closer to spoilers, I remain as dumbfounded as anyone as to the popularity of the “Fight Club in another setting” premise (taking over from “Die Hard in another setting”) as shared by Tully and near-contemporary Adrift—it’s a narrative strategy build on deceit and now-cheap revelations, and I’m not sure it’s a subgenre that will age well. Still, I found a lot to relate to in Tully’s sleep-deprived fantasies and can’t stay mad for long at the plot cheats that it needs in order to justify itself.

  • Up in the Air (2009)

    Up in the Air (2009)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In theaters, December 2009) Hollywood is so often geared to kids, teens and family that film made for an adult audience are now rare enough to be remarkable.  So it is that this tale of a professional downsizer confronting professional distress and personal attachment is perhaps more enjoyable for its change of pace than for what it actually delivers.  George Clooney is splendid as a protagonist who comes to reconsider a lifetime of non-attachment, and he has the good fortune of playing against two actresses, Vera Farmiga and Anna Kendrick, who do just as well in their own roles: The best scene of the film is a simple three-way conversation in a hotel lobby.  The script itself (which bears only a passing similarity to Walter Kirn’s original novel) seems to be exactly in tune with the times, in-between massive layoffs and widespread hatred of commercial airlines.  Many of the film’s individual moments are oddly amusing, the peek at the life on an ultra-frequent-traveler is interesting and there are clear echoes of Juno in the off-kilter structure of writer/director Jason Reitman’s script.  (Not to mention much of Thank you for Smoking in its cynical premise.)  But there also seems to be an upper limit to Up in the Air’s effectiveness, and the lacklustre third act has something to do with it: After a lengthy detour in Wisconsin, the script more or less goes back to business but studiously avoids wrapping up its threads.  Writer/director Jason Reitman would rather drag things on long enough to diffuse the impact of a more definitive ending, then ends up apparently one of two scenes too early.  Sure, the point is informed character non-growth –which is gutsy enough at a time where “protagonist learns a lesson” is ingrained in Screenwriting 101.  But the ending also deflates some of the film’s prevailing charm… leaving viewers, well, up in the air.  Sometimes, even achieving one’s objective is criticism enough.