BEFORE: Making some real progress on the Netflix list this month - today I'm preceding this feature with another comedy special, Michelle Wolf's "Joke Show", which I'm hoping will be on topic. Hey, it's a female doing stand-up, which is also the topic of today's feature, so how could it not be? Just 96 titles to go before I run out of Netflix, at the rate of two per day (1 film, 1 comedy special) I could have it down to a much more manageable size by the end of June. Then I can focus more on the other streaming services. (As of this week, the Disney Plus list is down to just six films that are not "Star Wars" titles I've already seen...)
Jenny Slate carries over from "The Secret Life of Pets 2", and one of this film's other actors is going to get me to my halfway point for 2020, which one will it be?
THE PLOT: A twenty-something comedienne's unplanned pregnancy forces her to confront the realities of independent womanhood for the first time.
AFTER: I sort of tentatively had this one on my romance list, which would mean I could hold it for next February, but when the linking dictated the need to put it here, so I could make a connection to the next set of three films, which connects to the next set of three after that, I thought things might still work out OK. There are still tons of films on the romance list, and next February's chain is probably going to be fine without this one, as it doesn't link to much else. There's also a nice unintended thematic tie-in with tomorrow's film, which is also about stand-up comics - also several comics appeared as voices in yesterday's film, so it's a loose theme for the second half of this week.
This is an expanded version of a short film of the same name, which was intended to fill a void in the film marketplace, namely to depict the topic of abortion in a non-negative way, as the director felt there were too many films relying on the trope of showcasing all the downsides when that plot point is included. My suspicion is that some writer based this on her personal experience, and found that her history or personal opinion on this topic tended to not match what is usually seen on film, but I can't find any information to confirm that yet. Which seems weird, because Hollywood has the tendency to be very liberal, and most screenwriters too, with notable exceptions of course, so it's a little strange that I also can't seem to think of a film that doesn't make having an abortion out to be some kind of horrible experience, for which a woman character is made to appear shameful or embarrassed before the procedure, and depressed and guilt-ridden afterwards. But then, the only movie that leaps to mind for me is "Fast Times at Ridgemont High". Wait, there's also "The Last American Virgin", but that's kind of the same film.
But I am getting a little tired of the other trope seen here, which is depicting a stand-up comedian bombing when something's not going well in their personal life. "The Comedian", "Joker", and I can probably come up with a few more examples - let's throw "The Big Sick" in there too. Look, even if a comedian is having a bad day, or a bad week, they don't stop knowing what's funny, or what works in front of an audience and what doesn't. Just like if I'm having a terrible day and I go to work, I don't forget how to do my job - I may not WANT to do the job, but I haven't forgotten how. A fireman might be going through a break-up, but when he gets to work, he doesn't suddenly forget how to put out a fire, right? In the same way, a stand-up comedian probably already has a routine worked out, it's memorized, more or less, and they believe that combination of sentences is going to make the audience laugh when they get on stage. So even if they're not feeling particularly hilarious, they know they can fall back on some material that's going to at least get them through their five minutes and probably elicit a few laughs. Here Donna Stern gets dumped and decides to just "wing it" on stage, and it's a terrible idea, of course - but I just don't see this happening in the real world of comedy. Look at what Patton Oswalt went through with his first wife dying, but he didn't stop being funny. If he wasn't in the mood to perform, I bet he just didn't perform, took some time, got his head together, but eventually he got back on stage and even talked about it in his comedy specials. Even funny people go through some painful life experiences, but they don't suddenly forget how to be funny.
But what's great here is that even though Donna is extremely anxiety-ridden over having to tell her new boyfriend that she's pregnant, to the point where she avoids opportunity after opportunity to do so, even though she doesn't tell him in a nice or constructive way (umm, she mentions her pregnancy AND her upcoming abortion in her stage act, while he's in the crowd) they very quickly get to a place where they can both crack jokes about it. So maybe while it's not a very good time to have a baby, the fact that they can still relate to each other, and even find some humor in a usually non-humorous situation means that there's some hope for them to work things out.
My problem here is that she was so sure that Max was going to react poorly to her pregnancy, that she didn't even give him the CHANCE to react at all, by not telling him, avoiding him, and then deflecting the issue. Deflection is a great comedy technique, but it's terrible where relationships and intimacy are concerned. Take it from someone who cracked jokes during his own divorce negotiations - and some of them even landed! I've made jokes in the hospital, like while getting x-rays or minor surgery done after a head injury, or while in pain from a kidney stone, so I know that if you can keep your wits about you and bring some humor during the tougher times, you may be OK. But of course, your mileage may vary, there may be hospital staffers or divorce lawyers out there who don't have much of a sense of humor.
Once again, I'm questioning the music choice - "Obvious Child" is a great name for this film, because it could refer to either the pregnancy or the lead female character herself, who is still childlike in some ways, but forced to figure out adulthood very quickly. It's also a famous Paul Simon song from his album "The Rhythm of the Saints", and I guess if you can get the music rights to that song, you should get them, only there's no thematic connection between the song and the movie's story. So why spend money on those rights if they don't bring any insight or meaning to the table? "The cross is in the ballpark", great, Paul, that's great, but what does that have to do with either stand-up comedy or abortion? I'm guessing not much.
This sort of reminds me of "Chuck & Buck", in that it's ground-breaking in one small way, but then there's no framework, no support system built up around that one little thing. In both cases there's about 90 minutes of not really going anywhere, except for that one big/little plot point that up until that point, had maybe never been seen before in a movie, even a small independent one. And depending on how you feel about that particular issue, that would either be like making the first car with a reverse gear, or perhaps the first car with cupholders. They may both be needed advances, but one's probably going to be much more important in the long run than the other.
Just to be clear, I'm not hating on the film for the same reason that the Moral Majority or anti-Planned Parenthood religious types would. I support the cause, and a woman's right to choose - it should be 100% her decision, but then again, there's a part of me that wonders if it could be 99% her decision and maybe we should save 1% of the decision for the potential father? I mean, shouldn't he at least be told or consulted or have his opinion asked in some way? It just didn't seem fair that Donna didn't even let him know until she'd made up her mind about how to handle the situation. I wouldn't suggest enough legal power to sway the decision, I'm saying like 1% as a symbolic value, a token just so he's not completely out of the picture at this point. Just a thought. It's a bit of a weird situation that some of the same people who support equal rights for women (50% across the board, and I'm fine with that...) also support 100% of the reproductive rights for women, but it takes genetic material from two people to make a baby.
(I noticed that while on a date with Max at the Italian restaurant, Donna ordered for him without even asking him what he might like. Now, if a MAN did that for a woman in a modern movie, the feminists would be all over this character, who had the nerve to just assume what his date wanted to eat! Why should this female character get a pass here? I found this to be very symbolic of her decision to terminate the pregnancy, without even asking him.)
Also starring Jake Lacy (last seen in "Johnny English Strikes Again"), Gaby Hoffmann (last seen in "You Can Count on Me"), David Cross (last heard in "Sorry to Bother You"), Gabe Liedman, Richard Kind (last seen in "Bombshell"), Polly Draper (last seen in "Demolition"), Paul Briganti, Cindy Cheung, Stephen Singer (last seen in "The Kitchen").
RATING: 4 out of 10 cab rides to Brooklyn
No comments:
Post a Comment