Crass, crude, foul-mouthed comedies have been all the rage at the movies for some time now, with the trendiest comedians from any given year dropping F-bombs, and spouting off rapid-fire fraternity jokes in their (almost always nudity-obsessed) star vehicles. Wet Hot American Summer and The State co-creator Michael Showalter‘s latest offering, Hello, My Name Is Doris, is the perfect antidote to the unending strain of Apatow offshoots: It balances classy, screwball comedy, bone-deep drama, and old-fashioned romance with the finesse of an Olympic gymnast. For once, it’s a rom-com with aims of enchanting and disarming us rather than grossing us out of our minds.

The film’s greatest boon is its star, Sally Field, an actor of age who puts on a performance so range-y, powerful and tender that it all but wipes today’s young, sparkling starlets from memory. She plays Doris, a sixtysomething recluse who’s lived in her mother’s cluttered house in Staten Island her whole life. Doris falls into lonely despair when her mother passes away but thankfully has her job as a paper pusher to keep her busy during the day. She’s the only person over 40 at her company though her role as office outcast could be more attributed to her cat-lady eccentricities (cat-eye glasses, headscarves, wooly knits and all).

Hope of getting Doris unstuck from her rut arrives in the form of her company’s new art director, a strapping, decades-younger Los Angeles transplant amusingly named John Fremont (New Girl‘s Max Greenfield). On several occasions, we get lost with Doris in fantasy as she daydreams about John confessing his love for her in front of their colleagues and hooking up with him in the breakroom. Field is ungodly adorable as she fumbles and fawns, and Greenfield does a good job of keeping us in suspense as to whether or not Doris has got a shot at John’s heart.

With encouragement from her best (only) friend, Roz (Tyne Daly)—who takes her to a life-altering lecture by motivational speaker Willy Williams (Peter Gallagher)—Doris decides it’s time to make a change and begins fashioning herself to John’s interests (facilitated by Roz’s granddaughter, who schools her on the art of Facebook stalking), making a concerted, somewhat creepy effort to cougar her way into John’s arms. Suddenly, she’s clumsily throwing around millennial slang, rocking neon yellow outfits and going to indie electro-pop shows headlined by John’s favorite band, Baby Goya and the Nuclear Winters (where the two “coincidentally” bump into each other).

Just as a tight friendship starts to form between them and the thought of romance doesn’t seem so inconceivable, John meets another woman, bringing Doris’ dreams crashing down. In a drunken fit of desperation, she sabotages John’s new relationship (via a lovelorn timeline post from her fake Facebook account), a plan that naturally backfires and leads to even more heartbreak. Showalter and co-writer Laura Terruso—who directed the short the movie is based on as a student of Showalter’s at New York University—hit every romantic, comedic, and dramatic beat so well that the movie transcends genre. This makes for such an enjoyable experience because, instead of trying to predict where the story’s going, we’re allowed to let go of preconception and go wherever the emotions may take us. Every laugh, every heartbreak, every moment feels sincere, not hokey or contrived. Nothing’s cheap; everything’s earned. The movie’s liberating in that way.

Field is so talented it’s scary. It should go without saying—she’s a two-time Oscar winner, after all—but the sad reality is that female actors over 50 are typically relegated to secondary, tertiary, often motherly roles. Her career, tragically, supports that narrative. But that’s why Hello, My Name Is Doris is such a gift; in all her glory, we get to see Field showcase her unparalleled mastery of physical comedy (watching Doris quiver and drool as John pumps up her deflated gym-ball office chair is insanely funny) as well as her earth-shattering dramatic chops. In the movie’s most powerful, unsettling scene, Doris hops up onto her couch, screaming at her brother (Stephen Root) to leave her house as she tearfully refuses to clear out the piles of old magazines and expired food her mother left behind. It’s scenes like this that reveal the psychological complexity bubbling beneath Doris’ cartoonish exterior. Such a wonderfully weird, layered character is only safe in the hands of an actor of Field’s caliber.

Bipolar disorder is the common ground that brings two opposites-turned-soulmates together in Touched With Fire, a cute but redundantly lyrical sanitarium romance inspired by Kay Jamison’s book “Touched With Fire: Manic-Depressive Illness and the Artistic Temperament” and the real-life experiences of writer-director Paul Dalio. Carla (Katie Holmes) and Marco a.k.a Luna (Luke Kirby) are manic-depressive poets admitted to the same psychiatric hospital where they at first can’t stand each other (naturally) but soon form a tight bond as they indulge in their shared mania and protect each other from unenlightened oppressors. The creative energy that forms between them is explosive and romantic, but when they choose to start a family, their manic tendencies begins to put their future in danger. Meanwhile, their stubborn, disapproving parents threaten to tear them apart for good.

In several ways the movie ponders the relationship between bipolar disorder and art, from Marco often referencing the legendary work Van Gogh did while manic to the couple explaining to their parents how they absorb the world in a deeper, fuller, more vivid way than normal people are capable of, which allows them to express themselves freely and unfiltered. Dalio also represents the disorder visually, using off-balance camera moves and surrealistic imagery to reflect our heroes’ mindstate. On occasion, the symbolism can be a little too plainspoken: When the couple are unwillingly separated and forbidden to see each other, Carla returns to the waiting room where they first met; we feel she’s missing Marco already, but suddenly an apparition of him appears to further emphasize her longing. The sentiment is nice and the device fits the artistry theme, but it’s a little excessive.

Dalio, who’s dealt with manic depression in his life, used battle rap as an outlet, performing under the name Luna. We see much of his personal struggle in Marco (who also battle raps under the Luna moniker) and the film’s greatest strength is that it feels passionate and personal throughout, evidently pulled directly from pivotal points of life experience. If there’s an issue with how the film ponders mental health it’s in the final acts, when the story starts to feel too studied, overly saturated by the influence of Jamison’s thesis. It’s especially jarring when the author makes an appearance as herself, meeting with the couple to discuss the dulling effects medication may or may not have on the creative process.

Movie romances often live and die by the actors’ eyes: If we don’t see that thirst in their eyes, we ain’t buying it. Holmes and Kirby, thankfully, are convincing in their desire, particularly early on in the film when they’re sneaking away to the hospital library in the middle of the night, going on manic adventures through time and space, unlocking the mysteries of the universe with childlike glee. The adventure’s all in their heads, of course, but Dalio does a nice job of bringing us into their headspace, sprawling projected images of Van Gogh’s “Starry Night” across the library walls to reflect the scope of the couple’s obsession. Moments like these, when Dalio’s visual style feels pitch-perfect, are magical.

On several occassions, Carla and Marco’s parents stage both planned and impromptu interventions, expressing insensitively their wish for the couple to stay far away from one another so as not to further enable their shared mania. The drama in these scenes sometimes works, but more often than not the confrontations feel too transparently educational, with the young actors essentially explaining their mental disorder for those of us in the audience who don’t understand it. Holmes is particularly good, though, at attempting to make the scenes feel natural with her facial expressions and subtle body movements.

When Carla and Marco are alone, running wild with the ecstasy of being unshackled from the doldrums of everyday life, Touched With Fire feels vital and flowing and engrossing. The filmmaking seems to dull, however, when the couple are on their meds and fall back down to earth. There’s no reason a film can’t stay cinematically interesting while still reflecting the internal repression of its characters and, unfortunately, coupled with the staged nature of the later dialogue, the sober segments of the story don’t quite hit home.

There’s something genuinely interesting about Pride and Prejudice and Zombies when it first gets going. As a relative newbie to both Seth Grahame-Smith’s book the film is based on and the Jane Austen book that book is based on (forgive my ignorance, I beg you), the juxtaposition of the white upper crust at the turn of the 19th century with the socio-political, blood-letting genre pleasures of zombie and martial arts movies is a lot of fun. Not blow-your-mind, innovative fun, but straightforward, shoveling-popcorn-in-your-face, night-out-at-the-movies fun. The novelty wears off, though, and what’s left is a decently entertaining but frustratingly anti-climactic pop culture mash-up that doesn’t quite live up to its potential.

Writer-director Burr Steers does indeed have a few good things in place at the film’s outset, most notably a game young cast who generally hold up their end of the bargain. Elizabeth (Lily James), Jane (Bella Heathcote) and the rest of the Bennet sisters grab our attention immediately, gossiping and fantasizing about their respective dream suitors as they tighten each others’ corsets and polish their pointy zombie-slaying weapons. (The movie’s gender-reversal twist is that, in this world, the women generally do the fighting while the men often cower away in a corner. It’s a strong sentiment that loses its power due to Steers trumpeting it too loudly.) The strongest male warrior in the land, the brooding, handsome Mr. Darcy (a pleasantly ashy-voiced Sam Riley), who Elizabeth at first detests. The sexual tension between them is as thick as butter, of course (they’re both stubborn loners), and James and Riley do a fine job building that chemistry. Jane’s matched up with Mr. Bingley (Douglass Booth), but their relationship’s only significant to the plot and nothing more.

Elizabeth and Darcy is where all the real action and drama stems from; their union is inevitable but is stopped dead (cough) by an impending wave of zombie hordes that threatens to wipe out all of London. While the hard-headed Darcy prefers to meet the undead head-on on the battlefield, Elizabeth meets a shady stranger who proposes a treaty with the zombies, facilitated by a process that placates their hunger for human flesh (feed them animal parts and they stop being belligerent assholes for a while). The plot really starts to get in the way of the actors in that they aren’t really given a lot of space to explore the more interesting corners of their respective characters’ personalities before a stupid string of exposition ruins the mood. That being said, James and Riley are a wonderful match and go above and beyond to keep us invested.

What’s worse, with all the anticipation built up of an unstoppable zombie army and the promise of a great war with the undead for the fate of London, we get absolutely nothing of the sort. There are a few displays of zombie slaughtering throughout the movie, but an epic, sprawling, LOTR: The Two Towers melee never comes. A disappointment to say the least.

The movie’s half-comedy, of course, its silly premise a clear giveaway that we shouldn’t take the material so goddamn seriously. Problem is, the movie just isn’t that funny. Again, much of the humor relies on the subversion of gender roles too heavily (is seeing a woman kick ass in a movie really so uncommon that we need to point it out so incessantly?) and the novelty of aristocrats being highly skilled warriors loses its luster before the plot even gets going. The movie’s major highlight is Matt Smith, playing the prissy Parson Collins who, despite his best efforts, can’t convince any of the Bennet sisters to take his hand in marriage. He first has his sights set on the already-spoken-for Jane but then concedes that he’ll settle for any of the sisters, a sentiment that isn’t met favorably by the girls or their parents (Charles Dance and Sally Phillips). Parson’s inability to see himself for the idiot the rest of us see him as is one joke that never gets old, thanks to the refined talents of Mr. Smith.

Steers tries to represent the wit of Austen’s material as best he can, but all the nonsense of the (frankly awful) zombie-slaying half of the story gets in the way at every turn. There’s a balance to be struck between respecting the integrity of Pride and Prejudice while having fun with the wacky experiment of throwing zombies into the mix, and Steers’ attempt is decidedly wobbly. The romance done well, but the decapitation, stabbing and zombie mass-destruction? That bit could have used an extra dash of crazy sauce to even out this unappetizing plate of lit-horror fusion.

As actors, Patricia Clarkson and Ben Kingsley have bottomless resources. They’re two of the best working today, and Learning to Drive is simply a vehicle for them to pilot smoothly toward the finish line. It’s really nothing more than that; the lead performances are extraordinary, but the script, the imagery, the sound—every other element—is decidedly ordinary. Director Isabel Coixet and screenwriter Sarah Kernochan paint New York City from an ignorant tourist’s point of view as it weaves a rudimentary tale of a vehophobic book critic named Wendy (Clarkson), who’s just been dumped by her husband, and her noble Sikh driving instructor, Darwan (Kingsley), who’s determined to teach her how to grab life by the wheel. It’s thin, copacetic material (the source material, a short story by Katha Pollitt, has more edge), but it lays enough of a foundation to allow Clarkson and Kingsley to work.

At the outset, Wendy’s left alone in her Manhattan home by her asshole of a husband of 21 years (Jake Weber). They had a huge fight in the back of a cab the night before, and in the morning, the driver, Darwan, shows up on Wendy’s doorstep to return a package she left on the seat. She notices from the big-lettered advertisement on his cab that he doubles as a driving instructor, and she asks him to be her vehicular Jedi master of sorts.

A teacher-student friendship blossoms at a steady rate, with Wendy and Darwan using each other as a rock to cling to as the rapids of life threaten to wash them downstream. Wendy wants desperately to visit her daughter (Grace Gummer) in Vermont (especially with her impending divorce looming), but can’t clear her head of her husband’s memory, an obsession that inhibits her abilities behind the wheel (her mind drifts frequently as she daydreams about he and his new girlfriend). Darwan has a seemingly tighter grip on reality though he lives with complications of his own. A political refugee, he and his illegal-immigrant roommates are under constant threat of deportation. Making things more knotty is the fact that his sister has arranged for him to marry a complete stranger to gain her access into the U.S.; Darwan finds he has more affection for Wendy than his new wife.

The script isn’t flawed in any major way, but it’s resoundingly underwhelming. Its views of New Yorkers (Wendy) and immigrants (Darwan) are as one-dimensional as can be without being offensive though Clarkson and Kingsley do a lot of heavy lifting to give their characters more depth. There are actually several moments of delight in which the acting between them is so good and dynamic you almost forget about the artifice that is the movie around them. In fact, it sometimes feels like the actors abandon the cross-cultural themes completely as they get lost in playing off of one another. In these moments, it becomes woefully apparent that the heavy-handed driving metaphor Kernochan drives home so incessantly is nothing but a pestering distraction from the real work being done by Clarkson and Kingsley.

Learning to Drive has some sweetness to it, most of which comes from the compassion in Kingsley’s eyes. The thought of someone in a scrambled mental state such as Wendy’s getting behind the wheel of a car is terrifying for its dangerous implications. If only Coixet and Kernochan would flirt with danger a little more in their filmmaking, we could have had a more memorable film on our hands.

There’s always that guy—that mopey, beer-bellied loser who sits alone by the fireplace at house parties, looking too lost in thought to give a damn about the goofs dancing around him. He’s the loneliest man in the world. Funny thing: he never leaves the party alone. That’s because there’s always that girl. That warm, doe-eyed girl who finds his wallowing sexy as hell. She’s drawn to him as if under a spell, petting his head like a sick puppy. They always leave together, and it always ends in disaster.

In Woody Allen‘s collegiate comedy Irrational Man, Emma Stone plays that girl to Joaquin Phoenix‘s that guy. A depressed college professor, Phoenix’s Abe Lucas shows up for his first day on the job at fictional Braylin College drunk and stumbling, his reputation as an distinguished philosopher the only thing keeping the dean and other staffers from sending him back home packing. He’s a tormented asshole, bored with the world, imposing his passion for indifference on his students. He sees potential in undergrad Jill (Stone) as a writer; she sees potential in him as her future husband. As Jill becomes more forthcoming about her feelings (it doesn’t take long), Abe insists they keep their afternoon talks strictly platonic, which of course only fans the flames of her desire.

Abe’s less reluctant to romp around with academic colleague Rita Richards (Parker Posey, again stuffed in a role too small), a similarly reclusive soul who offers to “unblock” him after she slinks into his faculty housing for an unexpected late-night rendezvous. Their sad-sack sex sessions are a mostly agreeable distraction for Abe, though he continues to spend lots of time with Jill, chatting about existentialist philosophy over coffee and toast. When they eavesdrop on a curious conversation from a neighboring booth at their local diner, the plot gets strapped with rocket-boosters: Abe finds himself reawakened when, inspired by what he overhears, he decides to plan the perfect murder, offing a total stranger in a stunt of misguided vigilante justice. The fact that he’s a professor of “ethical strategies” is the cruel joke of the movie.

Naturally, Abe’s rejection of Jill’s advances gets reneged when the heat between them becomes undeniable (his newfound—albeit twisted—sense of purpose has also lifted his spirits considerably). Phoenix and Stone, sadly, never reach such levels of synchronization. Maybe it’s her age or her eagerness to impress Mr. Allen, but Stone (like many other actors, to be fair) recites Allen’s dialogue in that stagy, stringent way that suggests they’re inextricably bound to the page. Allen’s writing is good (especially his one-liners), but much like Wes Anderson, you sometimes wish his characters would just cut the shit and talk like normal people.

That’s why Phoenix is so great in this movie; he messes with the game-plan a bit. He breaks up the typical Woody Allen cadence, slurring Abe’s words and taking labored, deep breaths to a rhythm all his own. Allen’s known for giving his actors little to no feedback, and Phoenix and Stone seem to react to that pass/fail style of directing in dramatically different ways, resulting in a pair of disparate performances, one doggedly disciplined, the other wild and naturalistic. Neither are bad, though Posey’s unhinged energy aligns more with Phoenix, making Stone feel even more fractured from the group. It’s frustrating that Posey continues to be cast in roles beneath her gifts, but it’s nevertheless a treat to see her finally collaborate with Allen.

Abe and Jill’s romance is one of Hitchcockian flavor, defined by dangerous obsession and poetic twists of fate. There are some amusing homages to Hitchcock classics, like when we see Abe and Jill stroll through a brightly-lit nighttime fairgrounds á la Strangers on a Train. Still, Allen is in his own voice, focusing on humor and theme rather than suspense. The writing’s at its most playful in the movie’s second act, where we follow Abe opening up to Jill and gleefully plotting out his broad-daylight assassination. Before and after this middle section, the movie feels stilted, save for a wickedly funny life lesson Abe teaches his students via an impromptu game of Russian Roulette.

For a movie about intellectuals rattling off eloquently-worded philosophical sermons, Irrational Man feels strangely shallow. These themes of blocked-up libido, cross-generational romance and existentialist neuroses have all been covered in previous films of Allen’s, which makes his latest seem destined to fade into the background of his crowded oeuvre like so many others. Phoenix is so chaotic and off-kilter as the miserable anti-hero, though, that he manages to keep you on your toes when the movie threatens to fall flat.

Judd Apatow and Amy Schumer‘s Trainwreck is an odd little thing. How does a movie so raunchy and brash ultimately turn out to be one of the most polished, classiest comedies of the year? Seems these two comedy juggernauts are the only ones in on the secret. Trainwreck‘s only rival is Paul Feig and Melissa McCarthy‘s Spy, a movie whose humor works very well, but lacks the discipline and sophistication of the former’s more socially aware material.

Yes, I said sophistication, and yes, Trainwreck sees Schumer tearing through Manhattan on a boozy sex rampage, with most of the humor stemming from calamitous events involving her nether region. This is the same well-crafted gross-out humor that rocketed Schumer to the front of the mainstream media line, the stuff that fuels her eminently popular show, Inside Amy Schumer. Her charm is her fearlessness and willingness to make herself look like an ass, as long as we know she’s being completely honest with us. It’s a winning formula, and one she employs to great success in her big-screen collaboration with Apatow.

Schumer, as she’s liable to do, plays a variation of herself (her character’s name is Amy) in the conventionally-plotted rom-com, which she wrote herself. Rabid sex monster Amy Townsend’s origin story is dispensed with quickness in the film’s opening: in a flashback to her childhood, we see her father (perennial grump Colin Quinn) explaining to she and her sister (played later by Brie Larson) that monogamy is for fools. Hence, Amy’s adult life has been defined by reckless sexcapades rather than traditional romantic pursuits. She’s got a steady boyfriend (an inexplicably hilarious John Cena), but he’s just there to take her to the movies and share the occasional meal with; she gets her rocks off with other men all the time, unbeknownst to the lovable muscle-head. (One of the movie’s biggest laughs belongs to Cena, whose ambiguously gay character intimidates another man by growling, “You know what I do to assholes! I lick ’em!”)

She works at a faux-classy magazine called S’Nuff, her editor a wickedly egocentric witch played by Tilda Swinton (whose character work has been fantastic of late). Her latest assignment is to do a profile on sports doctor Aaron Connors (Bill Hader), whose clientele includes Lebron James and Amar’e Stoudemire (both of whom play themselves, to moderate amusement). As you’ve probably guessed by now, Hader’s character turns out to be “the one,” the guy who finally convinces Amy to give monogamy a go. Their relationship hits some snags when Amy’s demons (sibling jealousy, deceased mom, dad-instilled bad attitude) compel her to reject Aaron’s affection, but things work out in the end, because Apatow.

The classic rom-com formula is represented here without deviation, but the movie works because it’s all just a frame for Schumer’s personality and charisma, which is rich and colorful enough to carry any plot, even unimaginative ones, to success. Moment to moment, she’s crazy funny, from her line delivery, to her facial expressions, to her self-deprecating physical humor. As in her other work, her social commentary sneaks up on you. While having tea with her sister’s prudish, soccer-mom friends, one woman confides that she has yet to explain to her son what gay people are. With a priceless look of befuddlement, Amy interjects: “Well…they’re people.”

Celebrity cameos, if anything, are the movie’s achilles heel. Some work (Cena), some don’t (James), but there are just so goddamn many of them stuffed in there that the movie threatens to combust under all the pressure. A moronic intervention scene including unfunny cameos by Matthew Broderick and Marv Albert is egregious, but not nearly as bad as a shoehorned fake arthouse movie-within-the-movie starring Marisa Tomei and Daniel Radcliffe, who’s only thrown in there to make Potter fans squeal.

Schumer and Hader bring the movie back to life whenever they share the screen, however. They glide in and out of tone with grace and synchronicity, and unlike a lot of rom-com couples, their arguments feel just as real as their romantic exchanges. Apatow and Schumer, despite their reputations as champions of crude humor, are storytellers of taste and restraint. They’re never cruel to us or their characters, and that discipline is what sets Trainwreck apart.

It’s a little disjointed and a little lacking in imagination, but A Little Chaos, Alan Rickman‘s sophomore directorial offering, is kept afloat by a dazzling period aesthetic and some winning performances. It’s a classical romance set in 17th-century France but wastes no time declaring its out-and-out British-ness with a sly opening text stating that, aside from the fact that there were gardens at Versailles (the story’s key location), the film’s historical accuracy is essentially null. (We’re in France, but it’s that movie version of France we sometimes see where everyone has proper English accents.)

Kate Winslet stars (reuniting with Rickman for the first time since Sense and Sensibility) as Madame Sabine De Barra, a widowed commoner with an unorthodox eye for design who’s hired to collaborate with master landscaper André Le Notre (Matthias Schoenaerts) in designing a magnificent garden at Versailles for King Louis XIV (Rickman). The esteemed Le Notre (one of the film’s few actual historical figures) is a stickler for symmetry and immaculate arrangements, and though he’s one of the most decorated landscapers in France, the King-commissioned project called for a more radical, outside-the-box vision, provided of course by Madame De Barra.

We watch as Sabine earns the respect of even her nastiest naysayers, turning snobby aristocrats into gawking admirers of her incomparable work ethic and unique brand of outdoors artistry. There’s a clear theme of gender bias and the gradual upheaval of female stereotypes, but the messaging never feels preachy. Rickman’s more concerned with Sabine’s psychological turmoil than her social deficiencies. Sabine’s driven mad by blurred visions from her past, clues Rickman uses to build a modest mystery (the payoff isn’t worth the time, but it gives the story depth of flavor at the very least). The spark between she and Monsieur Le Notre fails to catch fire due to her disturbed mental state, but the dashing dilettante’s advances persist.

Throwing a wrench in both Sabine and André’s romantic and professional pursuits is Madame Le Notre (Helen McCrory), André’s unscrupulous, socialite wife and promoter of his work. There isn’t much sizzle to the love triangle, which is about as schematic as it gets, but Winslet’s magnetism makes Sabine’s uphill battle through France’s wealthier set absorbing enough to buoy the film. She’s always been great in vulnerable roles like this; it’s breathtaking when she opens up and unleashes all of her character’s pent-up anguish and regret. She can make you hate her, too, as in her show-stealing turn in the Divergent franchise, but characters like Sabine are more in her wheelhouse.

Schoenaerts isn’t a great on-screen partner for her. He always looks sleepy and delivers his lines like some kind of broody vampire. Rickman has more success; when the King feels the full weight of the crown bearing down on his head, his subjects crowding in on him like lurching zombie servants, he finds solitude in Sabine’s company, her high-class naiveté making her a cooling oasis in a desert of empty affluence. A lovely scene between them in a private garden is the best in the film, a charming volley of breezy candor. Also adding a bit of queen-y fun to the proceedings is Stanley Tucci as the King’s prancing, purple brother, because that’s kind of all he’s been doing in movies lately.

Sabine and André’s garden is first and foremost an easy metaphor for their relationship, but it’s more enjoyably consumed as a stunning piece of set design (especially when it’s inevitably completed, cascading waterfalls and all). Costuming is always a primary appeal for a period piece, and A Little Chaos delivers with staggeringly detailed garments Rickman takes good care to show off (an early series of close-ups shows Rickman’s kingly attire being draped on piece by piece). The landscapes are scrumptious as well, particularly a country path tracing a sea of azure flowers and painterly trees.

The strange backdrop of large-scale gardening helps to alleviate A Little Chaos‘ unimaginative narrative structure, but once you fall into the film’s rhythm, you’ll be putting plot pieces together five steps ahead. Rickman’s storytelling is rigid as all hell (and cloyingly sentimental), but as actors, he and Winslet are on their game, and these two are always worth watching. No minds will be blown, but there’s enough whimsy and charm here to put a smile on your face.

Like Grace Kelly, Ingrid Bergman, and Greta Garbo before her, Blake Lively has got the kind of glamorous, rarified Hollywood beauty that makes time stand still. In The Age of Adaline she plays Adaline Bowman, a young woman for whom time stands still quite literally, a freak accident in the early 20th century endowing her with the gift (curse?) of eternal youth. Set in present-day San Francisco, Adaline is a romance fantasy with a preposterous-but-amusing supernatural premise, a great cast, and a promising young director in Lee Toland Krieger (The Vicious Kind, Celeste and Jesse Forever), who’s made a conventional story feel new again not by reinventing the wheel, but by giving his all to make the best damn wheel he can.

While we’ve collectively, understandably developed a cringe reflex in the midst of the current Nicholas Sparks wave of cheesy rom-coms (a wave that shows no signs of receding, god help us), Adaline is a modern romance worthy of an honest look. Lively (and her stunning wardrobe) will catch your eye immediately, but it’s her moving turn as a girl time forgot that’ll keep you in your seat. Better still, the film gives you something to take home with you, a powerful message about the quality of time as opposed to the quantity of it.

When we first meet Adaline it’s the present day, and she’s actually not Adaline: she’s Jennifer Larson, a 29-year-old archivist living in San Francisco. In a series of flashbacks sparked by vintage newsreels she digs up at work, we learn her superhero-like origin story. Adaline Bowman was born in 1908 and grew to be a beautiful young woman, finding herself in a happy marriage and blessed with a cute-as-a-button daughter, Flemming. Then, the accident: Reeling from the sudden death of her husband, Adaline crashes her car in the middle of a rare California snowstorm, plunging into a freezing cold river. A lightning bolt saves her from certain death, and in addition to jumpstarting her heart, the jolt of electricity stops her body’s aging process. The science of the phenomenon is explained in storybook-style narration by Hugh Ross, who cites a thermonuclear law that won’t be discovered until 2035. It’s a funny little wink of a joke that helps the absurdity of it all go down the hatch much easier.

As time passes her by and her loved ones out-age her (present-day Flemming easily passes as her grandmother), Adaline is forced into a life on the run, mostly to stay out of the hands of the government, who’d most likely like to cut her open and exploit her unique immunity to aging. This brings us up to speed and back to Jennifer Larson, her cover for the time being until she moves to a new city and assumes a new identity.

While some may view the prospect of preserved youth as a dream come true (I’m turning 30 in about a month, so to me the idea sure doesn’t suck), Adaline’s found her life to be lonely and cold. She can’t start any long-term friendships. Adaline is constantly forced to deceive almost everyone around her, whipping up lies out of thin air so as to not give away her extraordinary condition. You can see the veiled torment on her face as she shoos people away, throwing to the wind what might have been beautiful human connections.

The worst part of the deal for Adaline is that she must avoid or stamp out any potential romances. Aside from one “moment of weakness”, Adaline’s managed to keep the boys at bay; that is, until she meets charming philanthropist Ellis (Game of Thrones‘ Michiel Huisman), whose dogged flirting (and dashing good looks) at a New Year’s Eve party earns him a spot in the back of Adaline’s mind. Though reluctant at first, she eventually can’t resist Ellis’ charms, and for the second time in her post-lightning bolt life, she has a “moment of weakness.”

The first half of the movie is mostly carried by Lively, as the proceedings are pretty conventional, running through a litany of rom-com clichés. When things start to get more serious between Adaline and Ellis, however, an unexpected twist shakes up the entire movie, changing the mood and upping the stakes way higher than one would expect. The sudden change in tone revolves around a contrivance that’s arguably more implausible than Adaline’s condition, but if you bought the car crash, you’ll probably be fine with it. The main cast doubles in size, adding Kathy Baker and Harrison Ford into the fold as Ellis’ parents. The movie gets really, really good from this point on, and the addition of the older cast members seems to light a fire under Lively and Huisman, who noticeably step up their game.

The film’s greatest gift might be that it harbors one of Ford’s best performances in years. You can never tell these days how invested he’ll be in any given project, but Krieger must have the magic touch. I can’t remember the last time Ford looked so invigorated. He’s not playing a grumpy man (himself) here, but rather a man who’s missing something deep in his soul and carries around a world of regret. Almost every scene he’s in threw me for a loop.

Even Ford can’t outshine the luminous Lively, though. Adaline is a complex role that poses several challenges: Lively is a 27-year-old actor playing a centenarian who’s playing a 29-year-old; she has to speak with a faint pre-war accent (she nails it); and she has to be the authority figure in scenes with Ellen Burstyn, an actor 55 years her elder, who plays her daughter. The blossoming actress pulls it all off effortlessly, and she looks like a zillion bucks doing it.

Screenwriters J. Mills Goodloe and Salvador Paskowitz’s dialogue is hit and miss (their talent is more evident in their broad narrative strokes), but Lively makes the words sing with her controlled, gentle delivery. She also looks jaw-dropping in the period outfits draped on her by costume designer Angus Strathie, but that’s just the (ridiculously expensive) icing on the cake. The best compliment I can give the Gossip Girl actress is that I’m genuinely excited to see what she does next.

The story takes place in modern-day San Francisco, but Krieger’s version of the city is one that mercifully ignores the tech boom that currently threatens to sand down the city’s odd, beloved idiosyncrasies. He and cinematographer David Lanzenberg instead accentuate the city’s eerie side, setting Adaline and Ellis’ courting encounters in forgotten underground tunnels, shadowy abandoned warehouses and old hotels. The foggy City by the Bay is a fitting setting for a story so hauntingly romantic.

Michiel Huisman is best known for his work on TV, his turns on Treme, Nashville, and Game of Thrones making him the object of desire for female (and male) binge-watchers everywhere. And rightfully so! He’s crazy handsome, and despite hailing from Amsterdam, he can pull off any accent asked of him, making him a shoe-in for every hunky TV role that pops up.

The Dutch actor has greater aspirations than being relegated to playing the muscly eye candy on every project he takes, though. Despite the success of Game of Thrones, in which he plays Daenerys Targaryen’s oft-disrobed lover and quasi-advisor Daario Naharis, between shooting seasons of the show, he’s made it a mission to take on more dimensional roles and jump from the world of TV and into the movie theater.

Enter The Age of Adaline, Lee Toland Krieger’s San Francisco-set romance with a sci-fi twist. In it Blake Lively plays Adaline, a twentysomething who at the turn of the 20th century is struck by lighting following a fatal car accident, reviving her and, most amazingly, stopping her body’s aging process. As the people she loves begin to out-age her (including her daughter), she’s forced to live a life on the run to avoid being caught by people who may want to exploit her anti-aging properties.

Huisman plays Ellis, a modest philanthropist whose connection with Adaline might be strong enough to compel her to stop running. Ellis seems like standard rom-com fare at first, but when his father (played by Harrison Ford) comes into the picture, the story takes an unexpected turn that changes everything. Huisman’s first major role in a feature film is a memorable one that gets his movie career of on the right foot.

I spoke with Mr. Huisman in a roundtable interview during his visit to San Francisco to promote The Age of Adaline, though Game of Thrones talk inevitably popped up as the conversation went on.

The Age of Adaline hits theaters nationwide this Friday, April 24th.

How much filming did you guys do in San Francisco?
That’s the kind of question I try to avoid, and you start with it! [laughs] The thing is, shooting in San Francisco is a pain. We shot most of the movie in what we refer to as “San Francouver.” It was very strange for me, playing a character that is very much rooted here in San Francisco. It wasn’t until later, after we chopped the movie, that I made my first visit to the city. It seems to be the story of my life, shooting somewhere that’s supposed to take place somewhere else. I was here two weeks ago for the Game of Thrones premiere. Apart from one afternoon walking around and seeing as much as I could, the next day I had somebody take me around town, and I saw a lot. I managed to see the Bliss Dance statue on Treasure Island. You guys see that one?

No!
You should go see it! It’s awesome!

How did you get involved with the film?
By the time the script reached me I was already aware of Blake [Lively] being attached to it, as well as Harrison Ford. The thought of being able to play the male lead opposite Blake and being the son of Harrison Ford in one movie is too much for me, really. That was before I had even read the script. When I read the script, I was swept away by this journey of a woman through time. I thought it could become a very, very romantic movie that kind of feels like a small, independent, well-crafted movie, but at the same time, hopefully it appeals to a large audience. For me there is not a doubt in my mind; I was dying to be a part of it. Also, I come from doing a lot of great TV stuff, which I’m very proud of, but I was really eager to make that step and break into film. The Age of Adaline is special for me from that perspective because it marks the first time I’m playing a leading role in a proper Hollywood production.

Are you getting more offers now to play the “hunk” in movies and TV?
Yes, but I think it’s very important as an actor to spread your wings constantly and to not fall for the same thing. One of the things I thought was important during my hiatus between two seasons of Game of Thrones was to shoot a cool movie in which I’m not holding a sword. The Age of Adaline really hit that button.

One through line in your work is that you play a lot of characters that support strong, incredible female characters. Are you drawn to that?
I’m very thankful for the opportunity to work with [those actresses]. I love stories about strong women. I think that there aren’t enough stories about strong women in film and TV. I worked with Reese Witherspoon on Wild and I admired that entire project so much, and the way she played that character, too. If you look at it from that perspective, yeah, I get to support strong women, and that’s cool. I love that. But I also love stories about strong men. [laughs] Maybe in the future I get to play the strong man.

One of the most beautiful messages in the movie is about the quality of time as opposed to the quantity of time.
This woman’s found the so-called fountain of youth, and it turns out to be such a burden. I thought it was a very nice concept. I thought [the sci-fi element of the story], at least on the page, was not so far of a stretch. For a second I thought, “Maybe I should Google whether this is scientifically possible.” Maybe not with a human, but with a mouse. Can you actually kill it and then bring it back to life? I like that idea. You have to kind of go along with the movie’s concept, and I hope the audience will.

What kind of roles do you seek out?
I shot this movie basically a year ago. I went back to Game of Thrones, and it’s a show that’s so much about moments. There’s such a big cast, and as an actor I feel like I want to try to nail the moment. I was hoping to do projects during my next hiatus that don’t force me to nail a moment, that really allow me to be a character and carry a story not for a couple of scenes, but the whole way through. That’s how I pick, together with my team, the project I’m working on during this hiatus. I’m about to finish a movie we shot in Australia. We have a week left of stuff in New York…there you go! [laughs] San Francouver, shot in Sydney, takes place in New York. It’s very much a story in which I get to carry it the whole way through. I really enjoyed the freedom it gave me. In a certain sense, it adds a little pressure because I’m carrying the story. If the movie doesn’t work, it’s kind of on me. But when I’m shooting, I don’t really think about that. That comes a year later when I’m talking to people and they’re actually going to see this movie. When was shooting, I didn’t have four scenes to tell a story and sell a character, but one hundred and four.

Did you feel like you got to have that kind of arc on Treme? Even though it’s an ensemble, it was developed very thoroughly.
That arc was very gratifying to play, but it was that same thing. You get a couple scenes every episode. I love being part of a show, like Game of Thrones for example, that is so well made and so well written. The moments I’m trying to nail as an actor…they’re handing them to me on a little golden plate. “Here you go! You can say to the mother of dragons, ‘The queen of dragons without dragons is not a queen.'” You’re going to do everything you can to try and nail that line! I’m so grateful for that. But when I’m off of [the show], I try to do different stuff. Not only different genres and different characters, but [projects] I can carry.

I’ve met Harrison Ford once, and it was the most terrifying experience. I said, “Hello Mr. Ford!” and he just grunted and walked away. Was it intimidating working with him?
It was a different experience, really. [laughs] It’s a little intimidating for the first ten minutes because of who he is and because I admire him. But when we started working I was kind of surprised by how invested he was in this project and in this story. I think part of me though that, for him, this is just a little movie on his roster. But I felt like it wasn’t, and he gave it his all. Once he enters the movie, it not only puts it into another gear, but he also put me into another gear. He forced me to step it up. God, I loved it.

Harrison’s kind of known to not play well with fans. He hates hearing about Indiana Jones and Star Wars.
Everybody’s constantly asking me, “Did you ask him about Star Wars?!” Obviously not! [laughs]

Now you’re getting a little taste of that with Game of Thrones. You’re playing Daario!
The strange thing is, people are probing, but not really. They don’t really want to know. At least that’s my experience. “What’s happening? Don’t tell me!” I think it’s funny. You don’t want to know, really. You’d go crazy if I told you.

Daenerys’ storyline is going differently on the show than in the book.
We’re letting go of the books this year. I shouldn’t say more. [laughs] Everything I say is some kind of spoiler-y thing.

To bring it back to The Age of Adaline, your character, Ellis, uses his wealth philanthropically. What would you do if you suddenly came into tens of millions of dollars?
I would definitely set up some philanthropic foundations. A line in the movie I really liked was when he says, “It’s actually really hard to do good.” You try to do good and make the most of the money, but it’s actually really hard. Maybe it would be [a foundation] for the arts, something helping kids find a way into expressing themselves through music or acting, things that have given me so much fun and eventually a career.

A modern-day romance fantasy set in the ritzier neighborhoods of New York City, 5 to 7 is a charmer and a grower. It’s a grower in the sense that its lovebirds, played by Anton Yelchin and Bérénice Marlohe, at first don’t quite gel on-screen, but slowly, scene by scene, as the plot gets richer and the emotions intensify, a silky dynamic develops that makes the relationship thoroughly convincing and engrossing by film’s end. Writer-director Victor Levin goes for a classical-feeling New York in line with Woody Allen’s Manhattan and Annie Hall, or even Mike Nichols’ Working Girl, and while he adds nothing revolutionary to the long-standing NYC-romance tradition, he pays homage to the city well enough that the story wouldn’t feel quite right had it been set somewhere else.

The corner of 55th street and Fifth avenue is where our unlikely story begins. Arielle (Marlohe), a stunning French woman in her thirties, is standing outside the St. Regis Hotel, treating herself to an afternoon cigarette. Along comes Brian (Yelchin), a twentysomething so taken aback by Arielle’s beauty that he stops to light his own cigarette and strike up a chat. It’s love (or at least something that looks a lot like love) at first sight. Yelchin’s a handsome guy for sure, but Marlohe is a picture of high-class beauty (she was a Bond girl for goodness sake), and it’s a hard sell that a woman who moves and talks and looks like her would be so immediately enamored by a young man who, by and large, is your typical NYC hipster.

Things get harder to believe even still. Arielle and Brian enter into a relationship that, by American standards, is a straight-up affair: she’s got a husband and kids, but tells Brian they can meet up on any day, as long as it’s between the hours of 5 and 7 in the evening. Apparently, this is a common arrangement in France, and Arielle’s husband’s got a mistress of his own. It’s something out of a teenage boy’s daydream, but as we watch Brian and Arielle spend more time together, the impracticality of it all becomes easier and easier to dismiss.

At first, we see standard rom-com stuff: Arielle and Brian walk through the park, joke about their age difference, share drinks (Arielle gives him a blindfold taste test at a fancy wine purveyor; he administers a blindfold beer test at a dive bar), and share the occasional under-the-covers tumble at the St. Regis. As more of Brian’s personality is revealed, it becomes clearer why Arielle would be interested in the boy. He’s far from manly man (his voice is meek, faintly prepubescent), but he entrances her with his intellect and slick sweet talk (a struggling novelist, he has a tendency to wax poetic, which she finds irresistible). Brian finds their unique arrangement incredibly disagreeable at first (as most of us would), but he tries to understand, asking questions and sticking around because, well, he’s falling for her. Arielle finds his staunch commitment and cultural confusion cute, and like him, she gets sucked into a lover’s free-fall.

Things get more complicated, though, when loved ones outside the “5 to 7” bubble get involved. Brian becomes fast friends with Arielle’s kids, and Arielle is a hit with his parents (played by Glenn Close and Frank Langella, bickering and kvetching in light comedy mode). When their love grows too big for their daily two-hour trysts, they’re faced with the question of what they’re willing to destroy in the name of love. By this point, because of leads’ performances, the stakes feel sky-high. Brian’s a richer role to embody than Arielle, and it seems Levin thought he’d make the characters’ complexities proportionate to the actors’ on-screen experience. Yelchin does a great job of conveying the Brian’s conflicted and ever-evolving psychological state, but Arielle’s arc has less texture, and I’m willing to bet Marlohe would have been able to handle more than what she’s given. It would have been nice to have seen more distinctly the gears turning in Arielle’s head.

There’s something special about New York City in springtime, and Levin captures that intangible aura nicely. The film opens with close-ups of the tiny gilded placards you’ll find on most Central Park benches, each engraved with a sweet message, often dedicated from one lover to another. Levin douses the presentation with a bucket of fuzzy nostalgia, filming on the busy streets and by popular landmarks often and classing things up with an old-school, melodic score by Danny Bensi and Saunder Jurriaans.  5 to 7 will break your heart, mend it back together, make it sing, and then break it again. It’s schmaltzy at times, the love scenes are shot too rigidly, and the concept isn’t exactly novel, but Levin, a first-time director, makes a good impression.

Set in the heart of New York City, 5 to 7 is a story of an impossible love between a young struggling novelist named Brian (Anton Yelchin), and Arielle (Bérénice Marlohe), an older, married woman (and mother of two). Together they enter into a relationship that, per an agreement struck between Arielle and her husband, must only exist between the hours of (you guessed it) 5 and 7 in the evening. It’s a classical love story set in a city that’s played host to some of the best classical love stories ever written. Writer-director Victor Levin does right by the NYC-love tradition, weaving a simple yet emotionally complex tale that’ll leave you both crushed and enchanted. The film also stars Glenn Close, Frank Langella, and Olivia Thirlby.

We had a chat with Marlohe about following up her big role in Skyfall, filming in New York, what she learned from working with Glenn Close, how Rage Against the Machine helped her prepare for scenes, how much she’d put on the line for love, pancake happiness, and more.

5 to 7 is out now in limited release.

Were you dead-set on landing a meaty role after your Skyfall gig? There’s some real substance to Arielle.
Absolutely. I loved the script, and as an actress the role gave me an opportunity to show more of my range. It was interesting for me to go from one genre to a very different one. It was very exciting.

It’s a classic romance set in New York City. That must have been a dream come true.
Yes, I just loved filming in New York. It’s such an amazing city with an amazing energy. The experience was absolutely divine. I learned about myself, met incredible actors like Anton, Glenn Close and Frank Langella. Glenn I really admire. She has so much talent and charisma and is so versatile. She can do comedy and drama, and that’s the kind of career I want to build for myself. It was amazing being on set with her. Frank Langella was so hilarious and lovely. He would improvise a lot between takes and I’d laugh and cry.

I’ve heard that Anton’s maturity is beyond his years.
It’s true! He feels more serious, more controlled. He’s almost the father figure on set. [The movie’s] concept is very fun since she’s so much older than he is, but [as an actor] he’s the one who’s older. Everything is reversed! The contrast is interesting. The concept of the film is interesting. I’ve never seen a subject like this on screen, and it’s a comedy, but there’s substance. It’s an emotional, beautiful story. I think the balance between comedy and intensity of emotion is pretty interesting.

How did you approach Arielle?
I used a lot of music. For each scene, I’d find a track—whether it’s jazz or classical or Rage Against the Machine; anything—that I’d use to feed my imagination for the specific purpose of the scene. Part of it is that, and I also tried to prepare months before shooting, looking for inspiration from my real life that could bring the right “food” for the day. What I find fascinating is that I always prepare months before filming, trying to find the inspiration for scenes, but the magic always happens 30 minutes before shooting. I suddenly find the right trigger that moves me.

How do you envision your career as an actor? What would you like to be known for?
I really want to do drastically different genres and characters. I want to explore my own colors. I did Skyfall, I did this movie, and I have some movies coming out with a lot of substance. One’s called Revolt, and in that one I’ll be more of a Che Guevara, a totally different role. After that, I have a comedy [miniseries], and I’ve always wanted to do a comedy. It’s called The Spoils Before Dying, and it’s produced by Will Ferrell and Kristen Wiig. I have a particular love for crazy characters, whether in comedy or not. You know Heath Ledger’s Joker? I’d love to play a badass villain like the Joker. I love clowns! [laughs] Over-the-top, crazy characters I’d be happy to play.

Did Glenn give you any advice in the time you spent with her?
It was reassuring being around her in a way. You see these actors who are so talented and charismatic, and then you see on set that they’re so humble and have their own questions. To see that even incredible actors are humble and aren’t always sure about what they’re doing is so inspiring. For me, real talent is linked to humility and questioning yourself as a human being. You find evolution in your work, and I saw that in Glenn. To see her try things without being certain of the result was very reassuring.

Is the open marriage between Arielle and her husband really a common thing in France?
[laughs] Honestly, I don’t know. It would be interesting to see.

Watching the movie kind of forces you to ask yourself how much you’d be willing to do for love. Do you think you’re the type of person to put everything on the line?
You mean would I be able to have a 5-to-7 relationship for love?

How about this: Would you be able to break up a marriage for love?
It’s a very tough, complex question. I think the most important thing is to be respectful of who you are. You have to do things in a respectful manner. Let’s imagine you’re married but you’re not happy anymore, but you stay married because of a social obligation. I think this is not the right thing. You should do things that make you happy. It starts with being true to yourself. I think, yes, if I was in an unhappy marriage, I’d be able to break it. When there are kids involved it becomes more complex, and that raises more questions because there are more people involved. It’s a complex, case-by-case situation.

I’ve got two last questions, one about Arielle, and one about you. What is Arielle’s greatest fear?
Probably to miss out on true love. She has her kids, but this love [with Brian] is her only experience with real love that makes her feel like a girl, like she says in the movie. The greatest fear is to make this choice to say no to the opportunity and leave this love. Her choice isn’t easy. It’s a renunciation of the possibility of true love. It’s admirable, in a way, that she would renounce love for her kids as a good mother.

Finally, what’s your idea of pure happiness?
Oh, pure happiness. For me, it would be to live in the moment, connected with yourself. Connected with your senses, but also with truth, not distracted by outside judgmental voices—society, TV, your parents, whatever. To be free. If you can be free with the people you love, this is a good thought for happiness. Oh, and pancakes, of course! [laughs]

According to Hollywood you can get around anywhere in LA in 15 minutes, no one ever pays street meters, everyone orgasms every time they have sex, knocking someone unconscious is easy as pie, and Santa Claus is most definitely real. We’re not saying anyone is turning to Hollywood to learn the truths of the universe, but boy does it feel like filmmakers aren’t living in the same world we do. Nowhere is this more evident than in the completely implausible distortions poured down our throats and injected into our hearts in the form of romance films.

I mean honestly, have these people ever even gone on a date? Here’s our tally of Hollywood-romance injustices, just in time for everyone’s favorite red-bathed holiday: Friday the 13th. Wait, what did you think we meant?

Stalking is Romantic

Proven By: Sleepless in Seattle, While You Were Sleeping, Hitch, Twilight, You’ve Got Mail

Oh, the intrigue of strangers. The hottie on the street. The co-worker who doesn’t know we exist. The widow on the radio who lives clear across the country. Love at first sight/sound not only happens all the time according to Hollywood, but also leads to lasting relationships. And hiring someone to spy on/get the scoop on that hot honey you’ve been eyeballing is apparently a legit form of courtship. What no one seems to talk about though is just how creepy it is to form that sort of attachment in the first place. That these protagonists are clearly unbalanced. And even though the romantic interest might be weirded out at first that the lead lied, spied, or scammed them, in the end they find it hopelessly romantic. I’m sorry, but in the Book of Reality, that behavior calls for restraining orders. [Ananda]

The Cutest Protagonists are Hopelessly Flawed

Proven By: Pretty Woman, Bridget Jones, Twilight

The damsel in distress. Since the dawn of time she’s been every man’s weakness. How efficiently she throws into contrast his own robust manliness and put-togetherness. Do you fall down a lot? Spill papers at the office regularly? Maybe have no idea what forks to use at fancy dinners or generally just say the wrong thing all the time? Then you, my friend, are adorable and highly loveable—and maybe have a neurological issue that you should have looked at, or high levels of social anxiety disorder. Not only is this protagonist offensive to able-bodied women who rightly believe that one hires trainers/coaches/therapists and dates dudes who aren’t trying to take on those roles, but it also implies that women who embrace these sorts of meek attributes will be rewarded with love. Being loved for one’s shortcomings isn’t romantic, it’s backwards. And honestly, dating a woman that klutzy or awkward is bound to hurt in the end. [Ananda]

Finding Love in the Workplace is a Cinch and Totally a Good Idea

Proven By: Bridget Jones, The Proposal, Miss Congeniality, What Women Want, The Wedding Planner

Hollywood would have us believe that in the big wide world of dating, in addition to bumping into eligible single folk on the street, the next best option is one’s workplace. Whether it’s your saucy and sexual-harassment-lawsuit-waiting-to-happen boss or the co-worker you never noticed before, love is sure to blossom under the fluorescent lights of your office. Clients? Fair game. They walked into your office didn’t they? And no one would assume if you sleep with your partner on that big project that it could in any way backfire or be misconstrued. Hollywood people might be used to running into their exes on every other film set—I mean, they have A LOT of exes, right?— but the average person in reality would define that as a personal hell. Heck, there’s even a well-known idiom to make this rule of thumb that much easier to remember and avoid: Don’t sh*t where you eat. [Ananda]

Meet the Love of Your Life at 15… Because What Could Go Wrong?

Proven By: The Notebook, Titanic, Romeo and Juliet

When the average lifespan was 35, I suppose 15 seemed like a decent age for settling down and starting your ‘forever family’ since it was, for all intents and purposes, middle age. Nowadays, however, we’re all living to ripe old infirmity so getting married later in life has become much more of a common occurrence. Which is a great thing, judging by how well these young lovers fared: vengeful parents, murderous cousins, sinking ships. Who can really say that they’ve found the love of their life after one make-out session in the back of someone else’s car?? We can blame some of them on William Shakespeare, but the others we only have ourselves to thank. I mean, if chasing you up a ferris wheel and threatening to take his own life to force you into going on a date with him isn’t a sign of prime partner material, I don’t know what is. Let’s just say, it never hurts in life to PACE YOURSELVES. And if a complete stranger starts spouting sonnets at you, RUN. [Scarlet]

Love Conquers All (Even Affairs With Your Girlfriend’s Mom…)

Proven By: The Graduate, You’ve Got Mail

You’ve Got Mail is one of my favorite movies of all time. Nora Ephron knew what she was doing to us. And The Graduate is a cinema classic studied in film classes throughout the country. I get the sentiment. I really do. But someone has to give these people a reality check. Or at least lifetime couples’ therapy. There’s no getting past those major faux pas in the developmental stages of a relationship without needing to do a complete psychological overhaul, major emotional detox, and perhaps some good old-fashioned brainwashing. I mean, it’s bad enough having your mom set you up with someone—let alone her secret lover. And moving in with a superstore and destroying the only living link she had to her dead mother’s memory? It’s fine. Really. Nope. No sir. There’s no coming back from that in the real world. [Scarlet]

Violence is Sexy

Proven By: Gone With the Wind, 50 Shades of Grey

I don’t know what it is. Does the person having domination over us making us meek and powerless somehow illicit an attraction that is in our inherent make up? Maybe it stems from being a caveman and needing someone to grab us by the hair and drag us away in order to propagate the species. Whatever it is, you would think we might have evolved somewhat in a few million years. Unfortunately we still see cases in movies, especially those lauded by Hollywood as ‘the next big thing’, where it seems that there has been no evolution of any kind since those days of neolithic neanderthalisms. So many times the woman “needs” to have some sense slapped into her, to be grabbed violently in a “loving” embrace, to steal a passionate kiss from her so she might finally be made aware of her feelings for you. And yet doesn’t it all lead inevitably to a Lifetime movie-ending; where a woman and child escape to a sanctuary in fear? Not really inciting those warm cuddly feelings of romance. [Scarlet]

Love is Often an Epiphany

Proven By: Clueless, When Harry Met Sally, Jerry Maguire

Because the good people of Hollywood’s dream-world are often really busy being awesome, or being klutzy, or dating their co-workers, it’s not always obvious to them when the love bug has bit. It’s hard when wrapped up in your perfect life, or utter despair, or exciting career, to know when the light switch flipped. Lucky for them Hollywood devised the Love Lightning Bolt. A handy dandy device that strikes a character at the exact moment they are meant to know love has arrived. Usually it’s a complete surprise. And often it calls for spontaneous action. Is she on her way to the airport? Run after the chick! Is she in an important meeting? Bust that sh*t up! (See below for thoughts on declarations of love in inappropriate places.) Ok, what makes this most improbable is what usually ends up coming out of their mouths after this epiphany. “You complete me”?? No. Have some self-respect. Co-dependence is never sexy. [Ananda]

Love CAN Be Bought

Proven By: Dirty Dancing, Pretty Woman, Ten Things I Hate About You

We all know the scene, she carried a watermelon, and he’s just here to keep the, uh, guests happy. There are so many people out there disparaging the moral value of money. Dough. Moolah. Don’t they realize that if it weren’t for money, NONE of these iconic couples would have ever wound up together? Which, I’m sure, can only be a bulwark for lasting success in any romantic endeavor one might undertake. How on earth else would we have had Pretty Woman, a classic Cinderella story (albeit Cinderella as a prostitute)? Where would Bianca be if Patrick Verona hadn’t been bribed into asking out Kat? I’m not even kidding right now. Show me the money. According to Hollywood, money CAN buy love, ladies and gentlemen. We’ve been getting it all wrong. [Scarlet]

Yep, That Kept Person is Definitely Into You

Proven By: Breakfast at Tiffany’s, The Apartment, Moulin Rouge

Apparently this was a popular theme in the ’60s. But with movies we hold up as near and dear to our hearts. There was a certain endearing romanticism surrounding those poor young artists taken in so wide eyed and innocent by their unassuming benefactors and then drawn into an…arrangement. Could, perchance, you have met them precisely at a time when they where looking for real love? I’m not saying it can’t work but…there are a few obstacles one might run into in this situation if it were to occur in everyday life. And it’s not the fact that said relationship involved the exchange of money and/or goods. It’s not even the fact that love doesn’t seem to be an essential element of a romantic partnership for them. But their previous partner was paying for their living arrangement, bills, clothing, jewelry…and they didn’t even have to see them every day. How do you compete with that? Wait…do I detect a look of disapproval in your eye? [Scarlet]

The Perfect Match Is Actually Your Best Friend/Co-Worker/Neighbor/Recently Met Stranger, Who Knew?

Proven By: Something Borrowed, Thirteen Going on Thirty, French Kiss, Brown Sugar, Made of Honor, Just Friends

Every girl, and probably plenty of guys, spends time mapping out “the one.” They make a list, or cut out pictures in magazines. He may have far-fetched characteristics, like a keen intuition on when to grab chocolate and wine on his way home from work, or a deep-felt love for Taylor Swift, but he’s pretty fleshed out. So how is it in romantic films that protagonists walk around as though with blinders on? While most women would find it incredibly convenient if their male best friend also happened to be very attractive, very thoughtful, and very into them, the ladies, and often men, of the rom-com world are always completely oblivious. Like, are they impervious to puppy dog eyes and longing stares? Even the people who meet strangers and spend some time getting to know them seem to not understand that THIS IS HOW LOVE WORKS. How can anyone spend that much time with a person and never take a second to consider their characteristics and the uncanny way they align perfectly with everything they’ve been looking for in life?? [Ananda]

Weird is Adorable (aka the Manic Pixie Dream Girl)

Proven By: Elizabethtown, Garden State, Almost Famous, Bringing Up Baby, Forces of Nature, Serendipity

The MPDG is nothing new these days, and hopefully is on her way out, but considering Katherine Hepburn played her in the black and white days and “quirky” continues to be a word we adore using, well then weird will always mistranslate as desirable in some cases. The MPGDG is marked by her irrationality and, often unattainability, a weird girl (and sometimes weird dude, possibly referred to as an Affable Dork). You might know this person if they are the one who confuses the hell out of you in conversations while simultaneously intimidating you into not revealing your confusion. They trick you into thinking that the state of bewilderment they lead you into is a place of depth and romance. That you are somehow enhanced by their strangeness. It’s a lie, a clever ruse of nature meant to detract you from their shallowness and persuade you to mate with them… or it’s just Hollywood’s weird idea of what a normal person is like. We can’t blame them too much, there are not likely to be any normal people in Hollywood for them to draw from. [Ananda]

Declarations in Inappropriate Places Are Romantic Not Awkward

Proven By: Love Actually, Moonstruck, Notting Hill, That Awkward Moment, Sweet Home Alabama, 10 Things I Hate About You, Dirty Dancing

So you’ve just had aforementioned epiphany and realize you’re in love. There’s no time like the present! Put on those tennies and go get that girl/boy! Happen to be in the middle of your own wedding to someone else? No big deal, just go. Already in a relationship? Meh, you can deal with loose ends later. Walking in on a very public/very important meeting, public gathering, family event? It doesn’t matter, this is pressing. Other than the EXACT second you realize you’re in love, any other minute won’t do. Life is fleeting. Yeesh. Boy is Hollywood really proving they do all buy into the adage “live fast, die young” with this one. But of course what’s more appalling in romance films is that this ALWAYS works. Instead of fierce anger or mortification, the love interest seems to find this quite endearing. Or they say no for now, but they’ll come around. I’m sorry, but lose me a chance at career success or publicly humiliate me and I will NOT be falling in love with you. And for the record, kissing in the rain is super uncomfortable and why would you want me to catch a cold? It’s just rude. [Ananda]

One Night Stands Totally Turn Into Lifelong Love

Proven By: Working Girl, That Awkward Moment, Moonstruck, Two Night Stand, Four Weddings and a Funeral, Knocked Up

Forget the unlikely amount of hotties who hang out in the average movie bar, or even more unlikely the number of eligible single people at movie weddings, the sheer amount of protagonists who make drunken mistakes that turn into true love is staggering. Like, according to Hollywood this should be the only way girls attempt to find lasting happiness. No one ever gets STDs, they only rarely get pregnant, and they are often incited by the heat of the moment, which is a totally sustainable energy. Mostly I’d like to know what kind of beer they’re all drinking, because their beer goggles are giving them some sort of superpower for honing in on soul mates. Granted in some of these movies the characters acknowledge the total awkwardness of jumping into bed with someone quickly and then not quite knowing where to go from there, but the percentage of the likelihood of matching compatibility, using a limited knowledge of a person, expounded by varying levels of horniness is the sort of math I can’t pretend to do. It’s not the kind of odds you play in Vegas folks, that much I do know. [Ananda]

He Looks Like a Jerk Now, But Just Wait ‘Til He’s Changed…You

Proven By: She’s All That, Strictly Ballroom, My Fair Lady

Their motives might be different: some might want to win a bet, others a dance competition…but the end result is the same. Ultimately it boils down to highlighting just how worse off you were without him! Without him you were homely, uncoordinated, and probably needed glasses. Good thing he showed up. Good thing in his benevolence he picked you up out of that horrible scrap heap of nerdom and set you on the path to hotness. How else would you have learned the power of make up, contacts, and a few lessons in gracefulness? Of course, there’s always the empowerment that comes with self-actualization and confidence. But that won’t sell roses and chocolate!!! [Scarlet]

Directed and written by Sean Mullin, his début feature Amira and Sam takes a wry look at post 9/11 America through the eyes of Sam (Martin Starr), an Iraq War veteran, whose life is transformed through a relationship with Amira (Dina Shihabi), the niece of his unit’s former Iraqi translator.

Amira and Sam initially meet when Sam pays a visit to his friend, Bassam (Laith Nakli), who worked as the Iraqi translator when he was in the war and to whom he visits to return a lost emblem. After a brutally awkward meal Sam believes it’s the last he will see of Amira. But when she is caught by the police, boot-legging pirated DVDs, Amira is sent into hiding. Desperate, Bassam asks Sam if he will look after her. After being fired from his job as a security guard, Sam finds work with his cousin Charlie (Paul Wesley) securing investments in hedge funds.

Amira and Sam excels in finding the humor in the tragic. Mullin exploits the comedic potential of Sam, in his under-appreciated job as a security guard, and the irony of Amira trying to sell pirated copies of Western romantic comedies on the side of the road while sporting her hijab. Fans of Freaks and Geeks and Silicon Valley will already be aware of Martin Starr’s talents as a comedic actor and here he is perfectly cast, wringing every last drop of humor from scenes which might have fallen flat in a lesser actor’s hands. Dina Shihabi is also excellent as Amira and has real chemistry with Starr, often acting as a charming foil to his acerbic wit throughout the film.

It seems obvious that Mullin has a political agenda with his film. This is most evidenced in a scene involving a dispute between Sam and his corrupt cousin Charlie who exploits Sam’s army experience to further his ethically dubious hedge funds, by targeting former war veterans. Mullin’s message regarding the ego-centrism and ignorance of those standing on top the pyramid will certainly resonate with many still suffering from the financial crisis. However, Mullin’s political commentary is thinly drawn and offers little insight beyond the now familiar narrative of the ‘1%’ and the rest of us. Mullin is more effective when focusing on the small details, whether they be Sam’s charming cultural clashes with Amira as they build a relationship together, or his quiet conversations with army veteran and potential hedge fund investor Jack (David Rasche) as they reflect on life after the army. Especially affecting is the casual racism shown by Charlie’s friends towards Amira when she arrives at his engagement party in her hijab with Sam. Amira’s bold and confident belief in her own cultural identity, despite their criticism, is refreshing.

Amira and Sam is a charming film which despite its apparent cynicism has an inherent optimism that’s hard not to fall for. Its political commentary can be occasionally simplistic, but also offers important messages around cultural tolerance, and the strong performances of the film’s leads paper over any cracks in the film, bringing Mullin’s gentle romantic comedy to life.

With a little push one way or the other, Song One could have been something totally different. It could have been a cheesy romance drama about two lost souls serendipitously colliding in a night club in the hip Williamsburg, Brooklyn music scene…but it really isn’t that cheesy or dramatic. It could have been a dark, creepy thriller about a boy and a girl falling in love as they sip Prosecco over the comatose body of the girl’s little brother; that all happens, but the creepiness is totally unintentional (which makes it even creepier, somehow). Song One is neither of those movies, though those sound like movies I’d much rather watch. What first time writer-director Kate Barker-Froyland’s made is a millennial romance that just, sort of, stands still. None of its elements are egregiously poor, but as a whole it’s just, you know…there.

The film pulls a fast one on us in its opening, in which a young street musician named Henry (Ben Rosenfield) is struck by a car and sent into a coma. His somewhat estranged sister, Franny (Anne Hathaway), an anthropology grad student, flies home from Morocco. As a strange way of making up for lost time, she snoops around in Henry’s journal and listens to his favorite music and visits his old haunts. She discovers his favorite musician is Brit folkster James Forester (real-life musician Johnny Flynn), who happens to be playing gigs in New York. She approaches him after a show, tells him about Henry, and things get weird from there. James begins visiting Henry in the hospital and playing him songs (remember, comatose). He goes on dates with Franny, has dinner with she and her mom (Mary Steenburgen) and, as I mentioned earlier, clinks glasses of Prosecco with Henry’s family over his unconscious body.

The most compelling thing about the movie is the question of how Henry is going to react when he discovers his sister has been dating his idol while he was out in coma-land. I mean, that’s got to be the craziest thing to wake up to, right? Maybe he wouldn’t believe it and fall into denial, or maybe he’d be overjoyed to see James, or hate him because he had sex with his sister. Wait a second…what if he could hear them the whole time?! Alas, Barker-Froyland isn’t interested in any of this, not in the slightest. When Henry finally wakes up, he’s immediately wiped from the movie and we never see or hear from him again. Talk about a tease.

The movie showcases a bunch of musical performances, with Flynn performing a handful of songs and NPR favorites Sharon Van Etten and Dan Deacon (among others) being shown doing their thing on stage in smallish venues (Deacon performing “The Crystal Cat” under crazy strobe lights is awesome). The musical interludes feel detached from the story, though, and it says something when they’re the most interesting scenes in a movie with Hathaway and Steenburgen in it. The actors do a good job across the board, but it feels like they could be doing this stuff in their sleep. Steenburgen’s a good actor, but it ain’t pretty when she has to sell lines like, “I always told him to look both ways! You just do your best, you know? You just…do your best!”

The focus here is the romance between Franny and James, but it’s a really, really unremarkable one. They do all the things you’d expect them to do in a music-centric movie set in New York City: they play songs sitting on the East River until early morning, share headphones, mope about their privileged white lives. Some of their conversations are so mundane and cutesy it’s hard to swallow. They reminded me of those couples who always end up talking to each other in a corner at house parties because they’re super into each other, but no one else finds them interesting or wants to talk to them. This is a movie about that couple.

As a fan of many of the musicians highlighted in Song One, I can say that it’s at the very least a pretty good exhibition of their talents, especially Flynn (the songs were written by Jenny Lewis and Johnathan Rice, but he performs them as well as he would his own). The film looks slick, too, though it doesn’t really capture the NYC atmosphere, (always a missed opportunity when that happens). With more nerve or edginess or ambition, Song One could have been an impressive, star-studded debut, but sadly it ends up being little more than an adequate movie without a mission.

It came as literally no surprise when within a week of watching Appropriate Behavior I read that Desiree Akhavan—the film’s director, writer, and star—had landed a role on Lena Dunham’s HBO show Girls. Akhavan’s film plays like an extended episode of the NYC millenial-centric series. Only from a bi-sexual Iranian-American perspective. Which, let’s face it, is slightly more interesting and certainly more diverse than Girls’ privileged white girl problems (though don’t misread me, it’s one of my favorite shows.) Similarly to Girls, Appropriate Behavior is full of awkward and narcissistic moments, but feels so familiar to anyone who is in or close to this generation that it’s impossible not to be dazed. Considering its coming of age premise and New York setting, Appropriate Behavior could easily fall into the cracks among other movies released of late in that vein, but Akhavan’s perspective and her character’s development—something similar modern movies seem to leave out all too often—prove she’s an intriguing new voice and formidable talent.

The film follows Shirin (Akhavavn), a bisexual Brooklynite whose story is told in both the past and the present. In the present she struggles with a recent break-up from her girlfriend Maxine (Rebecca Henderson), now forced to find a new apartment and on the rebound. In the past we see the beginning, middle, and end of things with Maxine and how Shirin’s inability to be honest with her strict Persian family about her sexuality proves too taxing for Maxine, leading to their eventual break-up. Shirin’s reactions to her break-up range from trying to get back together by attempting to get on Maxine’s shift at their local co-op, to showing up at Maxine’s gay and lesbian support group and pointedly asking out the group leader in the middle of the meeting. The most hilarious and lowest point of their break-up is a run-in at a bar when Shirin and Maxine attempt to one-up each other with their dates, Shirin explaining her “rebel with a cause” boyfriend is “spearheading a campaign to bridge the gap in gentrification in Brooklyn through mass kombucha brewing.” Maxine simply responds “That isn’t a thing.”

Akhavan’s film contains plenty of sexual situations, and while her straightforwardness regarding these situations sometimes reads as unbelievable it certainly makes a statement regarding the normalcy of sex in Shirin’s life, not to mention urban twenty-somethings. One scene involves Shirin being (rather accidentally) picked-up by a couple and brought back to their place for a threesome. No other depiction of a threesome has been both hilarious and everything I imagine that situation would be in real life. Shirin—clearly more into the female then the male—is at moments awkwardly left out while trying to uphold the “sexiness” factor with both partners. And when the male starts to catch on the chemistry is clearly better between Shirin and the woman, his ego can’t quite take it. It’s funny and pointedly gawkish.

Appropriate Behavior begins and ends on subway trains and, like any Woody Allen movie or NYC-based rom-com, it stresses the public nature of braving emotional upheaval in a crowded city. Life happens, and in close quarters everyone is going to see it, in fact those used to city life could hardly be expected to even try to hide their distress. These two very different train sequences—the first dark and showing Shirin tear-stained and surrounded by rowdy teenagers, the second sunlit with Shirin smiling—are excellent bookends to the film, showing that while she’s been distracted by her loneliness and facing her family’s expectations, she has found a peace within herself.

The film suffers only slightly at points in bouncing from similar situation to similar situation, weighing down the pace. There are also far too many side characters including Shirin’s new weed smoking employer Ken (30 Rock’s Scott Adsit) who recruits Shirin to teach children how to make films. However, this situation leads to some of the film’s best analysis of Shirin, including her hurt ego when snubbed by 5-year-olds, and her eventual ability to let go and allow her students to create on their terms—resulting in a hilarious film involving farts and zombies.

Akhavan’s début showcases a unique new voice, though the conversation is hardly new. Her comedic timing and keen self-awareness are demonstrated by just how oblivious she portrays Shirin. And while Shirin’s heritage has much to do with her problems, her family’s expectations proving incredibly high-set, Akhavan never depicts that aspect of herself, or her bisexuality for that matter, to be more or less frustrating than simply being a young-woman looking for, and attempting to understand, love. Forget the ironic hipster title, setting, wardrobe, and subject-matter, which mostly serve to add to a sense of intimacy in their familiarity, the real originality in Appropriate Behavior is its perspective, and where her film may lack, Akhavan makes up for it in authenticity.

Always Woodstock is the kind of movie I rather see as a slap in the face to hard-working single girls all over the world. The sort of nonsensical rom-com that actually asks audiences to find something admirable (adorable?), if not believable, in the general notion that those who work hard and get screwed over will have nothing but serendipity later, just so long as they can appreciate it when it happens. It’s the sort of world where starting over means immediately finding everything you were missing before. It’s fantasy, and not the satisfying kind.

Hardworking career girl Catherine Brown (Allison Miller) slaves away at a record company, babysitting egotistical talent and being generally unappreciated by her superiors. At home she is inexplicably engaged to an obviously narcissistic actor who has a sex addiction. As seems to always be the case in these sorts of hackneyed scripts, her life is thrown into chaos in the course of one day when she is inexplicably fired (no, like really, there’s a law suit there for sure) and comes home to a cheating boyfriend. Her life in disarray, she decides to move back to her childhood hometown of Woodstock, where the abandoned home she inherited (oh that we could all have houses given to us) gets the magical Mary Poppins treatment and suddenly looks like a Crate and Barrel catalog. In her first night in town, Catherine wanders to the local bar, gets drunk, and is taken care of by the young, handsome, and apparently single doctor Noah (James Wolk). Determined to pursue her dreams of being a folk singer, Catherine starts working on her music — with the help of an older singer/songwriter Lee Ann (Katey Sagal, descending the ranks to play a role beneath her) — and since everyone in this town seems to have an interest in music (though strangely not of the hippy variety despite the town’s history) she seems to have support in every corner.

Where things get unreasonable is that she faces that oh-so-unbelievable dilemma of facing career success and love life success simultaneously — a feat well known to be almost impossible to handle with suave fluidity.

Ok, so my snark may need to be put in check, but its hard to watch women be given good things on-screen only to be represented as wholly unable to manage. Allison Miller is affable enough, having a sweet demeanor that takes the edge off her illogical situations. As for her musical abilities, not so believable. Especially since she’s basically handed instantaneous success for what sounds essentially like the basic crooning of any dorm-room solo act. Not to mention she’s essentially offered the option of selling out before she’s even technically “sold” anything.

First-time writer/director Rita Merson gives off the feeling that her end goal was to make a movie, not that it was to make a particularly original one. The curves may not be wholly predictable, but all of them are groan-inducing. It’s just getting harder and harder to believe that the women in today’s rom-coms wouldn’t have seen enough rom-coms themselves to not fall for all the same tricks anymore.

See your new boyfriend walking out of an office with an attractive young woman? Best to jump to conclusions. Ex-fiance comes out of the woodwork at the 11th hour and claims to be rehabilitated? Definitely worth discussing. Got an important meeting on the same day you promised someone you’d be somewhere AND you lose your phone? Silly you.

There is a place for the rom-com in this world. There’s even a place for a storyline involving a woman transitioning careers and starting over in a small town (it’s been done many times to much better success), but I think it’s obvious the world has outgrown certain clichés and Merson manages to hit on almost all of them. Watch it if you want to see Katey Sagal sing, a talent she should be used for more often. Watch it if you want to see Rumer Willis with her trademark cool girl scowl. Watch it if you have no other expectations from a rom-com other than to see a dreamy love interest, and James Wolk certainly is. But honestly if you want a generic saccharine rom-com experience, you’re better off heading over to Hallmark where they at least aren’t taking themselves at all seriously.

Viewing an on-screen relationship from somewhere in the middle can be a difficult place to be in as a film viewer. Finding two characters in a juncture in their story when one’s had no time to form any sort of attachment yet, makes for the sort of film viewing that practically demands distance. The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby most certainly asks that of its viewers. Asking for patience in abundance as it fills us in on the current, past, and potential future of a young New York couple. And to make sure the severity of their rift is felt, the film opens with a suicide attempt.

Eleanor Rigby (Jessica Chastain) has a name inspired less by the Beatles and more by missed opportunity and a sense of fate. After a brief scene of young love between her and boyfriend Conor (James McAvoy), she’s seen biking down the Brooklyn bridge. With a sense of calculation, she leaves her bike and heads for the fence.

In the hospital, Conor, her now husband, flies to her side, panicked. But when she’s healed and it’s time to leave, it’s her sister Kate (Jess Weixler) who takes her back to their childhood home to stay with their parents. Her French musician mother Mary (Isabelle Huppert) awaits her on the front steps, glass of wine in hand. Her father Julian (William Hurt), the academic and therapist, is especially concerned and encourages Eleanor to take some classes while she figures out her life.

Eleanor enrolls and when her father encourages her to crash Professor Friedman’s (Viola Davis) class, she does so with hardly any real argument why Professor Friedman should allow her to join the class, but an unlikely friendship is sparked between the two and Eleanor finds her to be an encouraging outsider. A safe friend unaware of Eleanor’s tragic recent past.

Meanwhile Conor does his best to find out how Eleanor is, since she’s thrown away her phone, resorting eventually to stalking her at the school. He passes her a note in her class one day and upsets her enough that she leaves class. Despite what little we know of their former selves before this juncture in their relationship, it’s clear Eleanor has changed greatly and it’s equally true Conor wants to return to what they once had. One of them stuck in the ambiguity of who they are, and who they are as part of a couple after a major life change, and the other stuck in the remembrance of how good things once were.

It’s easier to understand The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby when one takes into account that it was originally two films. Him and Her. One focused on their relationship from Conor’s perspective, the other from Eleanor’s. At times throughout the film there seems to be much left unsaid, much that was most likely covered in the individual films that was cut to make Them work without being overwhelming.

But it’s exactly that hesitation that keeps The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby from true greatness. In his feature directorial début (or should we call it third film?), Ned Benson has crafted a tale of two people completely unable to communicate. And though the inability to communicate with someone at a juncture where grief makes it entirely hard to relate is realistic, as an editing and filmmaking tool it makes for somewhat frustrating viewing.

The emergence of the so-called “anti-romance” is a sign of the times, of the burgeoning destruction of the Hollywood ending in favor of realism and relatable romantic scenarios. And while I appreciate this perspective and the way it resonates in our modern world, I can’t help but always wonder where the realistic side character is, the one yelling at the main characters to grow up and just have a normal conversation. Bill Hader‘s Stuart, Conor’s best friend and chef at his restaurant, comes close. Doing his best to explain to Conor the egg shells he has to walk on around his friend when it comes to his marriage. And Viola Davis is truly fantastic as Professor Friedman, but her wisdom and usefulness to Eleanor seems to stem entirely on her not actually knowing anything about Eleanor and her immediate life. She just seems to accidentally give Eleanor the friendship she needs at a time when she accidentally needs it.

Plenty of conversations with their family members would seem to be the ideal pathway to character growth, but strangely it’s these scenes that drag the most. Much of the time spent skirting around the obvious topics needing real study.

The audience is only clued in to Eleanor and Conor’s central concern rather late in the film, though it’s not hard to figure out they don’t suffer from simple relationship troubles. Strangely Benson chooses to show flashbacks from the couple’s early days, before they were married and in the blissful throes of young love, rather than scenes from their marriage. In a sense it brilliantly shows the same blind spot the main characters seems to possess, an idea of when things were new and good, juxtaposed with the present when they seem so bad, while showing an unawareness of when they were just in the middle, living out their love on a day by day basis.

With all that anti-romance, anti-Hollywood ending, the characters fall into an age-old trap, resorting to reinventing themselves, albeit by returning to former passions and plans they once had before their marriage and troubles. So although the film won’t allow us to call its ending “sad” per se, it certainly doesn’t warrant the descriptor of “realistic”. Though I’ll give kudos to Son Lux for the musical placement, toying quite effectively with our hearts in a few key areas with some well-placed songs in a way that gives the implication of romance without actually showing it.

Chastain and McAvoy give phenomenal performances, every other scene playing out like the clip played by the Academy before they announce who gets the Oscar. But without the structure the story needs, their performances simply hit the screen as heavy and ineffective, the lack of insight into their psyches making for a detached relationship with viewers.

The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby has all the realism of watching a pair of friends go through a rough spot in their relationship, without any of the catharsis of being able to advise and yell at them as perhaps a good friend ought to.

It’s a scary thing for a first-time director to take on a musical in his first at-bat, but Stuart Murdoch is a seasoned artist with experience in another art form. That art form happens to be music: Murdoch is the frontman of Belle & Sebastian, which obviously gives him a unique advantage in his charming debut, God Help the Girl, an indie-pop fantasy set in his beloved hometown of Glasgow. Murdoch released a concept album of the same name in 2009, and the film version of his passion project is a natural, seamless extension of his initial vision. It’s a bit too restrained on all fronts, but the film’s young leads are wonderful, the songs are catchy and clever (Belle & Sebastian fans will be thrilled), the cinematography is shimmery and sharp, and it’s an all-around pleasurable experience.

But above all else, Murdoch gives indie kids a film that speaks (and sings) to them directly. Our two central characters meet at a rock show in a small club. Watching the show from the crowd is Eve (Emily Browning), an aspiring musician herself who’s just escaped the walls of the mental health center where she’s being treated for anorexia and anxiety. On stage is a nerdy singer-songwriter named James (Olly Alexander), who gets into an on-stage (eventually spilling off-stage) tussle with his drummer because he can’t hear his vocals over the drums. After the show, James finds Eve sulking in a stairwell, and a friendship (and a band!) is born. They soon recruit another musical collaborator by the name of Cass (Hannah Murray), a cheery confidant who’s cute as a button and loves riding bikes. Anyone who came up in the indie club scene will recognize just how truthful a representation of the culture Murdoch’s put on screen.

But the film isn’t grounded in authenticity or reality; this is a musical after all, and the summer of songwriting, random kayak rides, and bowling alley gigs we see our trio share is a more heightened, wondrous version of the culture it represents than an accurate portrait of it. They’re living in an indie dreamworld. If you’ve ever tried to recruit band members by posting fliers around town, you know how unfruitful (albeit classic) a recruiting method it is. (Yes, I’ve done this before and yes, it was pathetic.) Eve, James and Cass have no trouble with this, as they find themselves literally running away from a hungry pack of would-be band members, giant smiles on their faces. Moments like these are genuinely gleeful, warm and fuzzy, adorable, and unstuck from reality.

Cracks eventually do begin to form within the band, because if they didn’t, the already paper-thin plot would be all but shapeless. There are disagreements about band names, debates on the virtues of artistic integrity and commercial appeal, and a weak romantic angle revolving around Eve, but none of the drama is affecting. The story is completely formulaic, but the good news is that Murdoch’s music isn’t; the musical numbers are the film’s strongest asset, with Murdoch’s lyrics conveying the characters’ mindsets nicely. The jaunty, sometimes tender songs are beautifully written and orchestrated, and a few Belle & Sebastian classics are weaved in as well. (The playful “Funny Little Frog” is a welcome inclusion.)

Alexander is sweet and likable, and it’s clear that he can genuinely play the instruments in his hands. (Outside of acting he’s in a band called Years and Years.) James is more than a little archetypal, but Alexander is so good you won’t really care. Murray’s enthusiasm is enchanting, but her singing voice feels a bit withheld and faint. Browning’s voice, on the other hand, is extraordinary, as is her non-singing performance, and her dollish look works well with cinematographer Giles Nuttgens’ vibrant visual style. The intimate moments between Eve and Olly are tender without feeling mushy, like when she crawls in bed with him late at night because she can’t sleep. He gently drapes his arm around her with no motive other than to ease her worries.

If there’s anything to knock about the film’s look, it’s that the camera movement feels too choreographed and rigid. A more free-flowing approach might have reflected the characters’ wild spirits better. Murdoch and Nuttgens make Glasgow look absolutely gorgeous, with the blue-ish gray urban architecture nestled in lush greenery acting as the perfect setting for their modern fairy tale.

God Help the Girl trailer

Releasing this Friday, Ira Sachs‘ Love is Strange is a ballad of two lovers named Ben and George (played by John Lithgow and Alfred Molina, respectively) who, when forced to sell of their NYC apartment due to George losing his job, find themselves lost in a world unfamiliar. Ben is taken in by his nephew (Darren Burrows), his wife (Marisa Tomei), and his teenage son (Charlie Tahan), while George moves in with two cops (Manny Perez and Cheyenne Jackson), who live downstairs from the old apartment. The old fellows have a difficult time adjusting to their new environments, but at the end of the day, they know they can always find peace within their love for one another.

We spoke with Sachs in San Francisco about the film’s optimistic take on romance, Lithgow and Molina falling in love on set, the beauty of Chopin, the cyclical nature of love, “human” camera lenses, his experience in independent filmmaking, and more. Check out excerpts from the interview below, with the full clip at the bottom.

Playing at the San Francisco Jewish Film Festival tomorrow night at the California Theater in Berkeley, Austin-based filmmaker Steve Mims’ Arlo & Julie is a quirky indie comedy about the titular couple, who begin receiving mysterious jigsaw puzzle pieces in the mail. More optimistic than your typical suburban indie, the film uses elements of mystery and light-hearted humor to make for a fun, easily-digestible experience.

Steve spoke with us about the project’s origins, the film’s unique comedic tone, finding his actors, the film’s unique mix of genres, and more.

See Arlo and Julie tomorrow night, August 2nd, at 8:55 at the California Theater in Berkeley.

You filmed in Austin, correct?
Steve: Correct. We filmed in Austin and a little bit in West Texas. I had a great time shooting a short with the main actor, Alex Dorbrenko. I talked to him about this idea I had: What would happen to you if you found a piece of a puzzle in the mail and you just kept getting them? My thought was that initially you’d be dismissive, but eventually you’d reach a point where you wouldn’t be able to think about anything else. I started writing it for him to be the main character, and he introduced me to Ashley Spillers, so I started writing it for both of them. All of the other actors came through those two, because they knew a lot of people in the area from working here for a long time. The script got populated with actors that they worked with before. I wrote the script over about six months.

Ashley and Alex are so sweet in the film. Are they like that in real life, and did their personalities inform the tone of the film?
Steve: They are a lot like their characters. Ashley’s super charming. You don’t run into people who really have something special all the time, but she has that. The tone of it? It’s obviously a lightweight film. Certain things resonate with people in terms of the embedded issues of truthfulness, but on the whole, you can’t make a movie about people putting a jigsaw together and have it be anything other than fun. To me, the movie closest to this in tone is Stolen Kisses from 1968. If you haven’t seen that movie…you’ve got to see it. It’s really inventive and fun.

The puzzle and the painting that’s involved in the film’s plot are two very striking visual latching-on points.
Steve: I had the idea for the puzzle for a while, and for the painting, I thought it had to be something abstract. I wanted to have it somehow connected to what the characters are going through. We had people on the crew who worked almost full-time trying to put that puzzle together. It’s an abstract puzzle, so there aren’t a lot of edges that you can find to help you along. It drove people crazy. It was 2000 pieces. In reality, Arlo and Julie would have never put that thing together, because we had a team of people working non-stop on that thing!

This film is a mystery, a comedy, and a romance all in one. It’s a great mix for an indie film.
Steve: Thanks so much. I think people have an expectation of what an independent movie is, and I think that’s why the movie’s done so well. People are caught off-guard by the nature of the movie itself. People laugh as well, which is nice.

There’s a very peculiar tone to the film’s humor, and everyone in the cast seems to understand it.
Steve: I’m super lucky. Mallory Culbert, who plays Trish, is really sharp and funny. Her boyfriend in the movie, Hugo [Vargas-Zesati], is also great. They’re the type of actors who can do something five ways and all five ways are really good. The most experienced guy in the movie is Chris Doubek, who plays the mailman. He’s the real deal, and he was terrific. The tempo of the film is fast, with the beats in the dialogue being pretty rapid. It’s not that naturalistic; hopefully it sounds natural, but you can’t really drag these jokes out. It was fun.

The ’20s soundtrack is really great. Did you always have it in mind?
Steve: From the beginning. I was editing the film, too, and I was putting these pop tracks from the ’20s in there. I’m a big fan of that music. There’s a program here in Austin about that music that I listen to every week. Also, Arlo is a historian, so he sort of lives in the past. There’s a visual motif in the movie with a gramophone, and there’s a DJ in Austin who you can hire to use her gramophones and 78s. That music is obviously old, so we wanted to plant that seed early on in the film of, somehow in the logic of this movie, this is where it’s coming from.

How excited are you to screen at the San Francisco Jewish Film Festival?
Steve: We’re so thrilled! It’s such an honor, and I can’t wait to get there. It’s going to be such a blast. I’ve been so busy working that I haven’t had time to mention it, but we’re all super excited to be there.

Woody Allen returns to his touristic tendencies in Magic in the Moonlight a film set in the gorgeous natural surroundings of the south of France circa 1928. This is a decidedly light and breezy outing for Mr. Allen, but one that has an enchanting air about it, pleasurable until the end. Those who delight in Allen’s witty banter will find a treasure trove of funny lines to recite for their friends, but a momentous work this is not; a lack of narrative finesse and tepid chemistry between its two stars stops the film short of the greatness of Midnight in Paris, Vicky Cristina Barcelona, and Match Point, his best films of the 21st century.

Driving the film is Stanley Crawford, a British, world-renowned illusionist played by a perfectly casted Colin Firth whose signature sternness serves the role well. Firth plays Stanley with a good measure of high-class English properness (he’s a natural at that kind of thing) mixed with a heavy dose of skepticism and boorishness that makes him a compelling and hilariously crude protagonist. Stanley’s tasked by a friend to debunk a ravishing American mentalist named Sophie (Emma Stone), who’s been dazzling rich folk along the French Riviera. Aside from being known to the world as Wei Ling Soo, the Chinese master magician (he wears a costume and make-up when he performs), Stanley also boasts an unblemished streak of disproving mystics, a streak he has every confidence will remain unbroken given a few days with Sophie at one of her wealthy victim’s sprawling estates.

On the surface, Magic is a sweetly entertaining cat-and-mouse romance full of laughs and stunning vistas, and this is where its pleasures would end in the hands of a less experienced filmmaker. Allen adds introspective depth to the film, however, as his cynicism and disillusionment with the world around him are embodied by Stanley, who’s constantly convinced that all good things are a hoax. (He is a professional hoaxer, after all.) But Allen reckons with this negative energy in the film by telling a story that knocks Stanley down a few pegs and convince him that there are, in fact, unexplainable delights in this world that we should bear no shame in indulging. Sophie, a ray of sunshine and spirituality, is Allen’s emphatic endeavor to make believers of non-believers.

While Sophie’s seances and impromptu “mental vibration” readings stupefy and astound everyone around her, Stanley’s gift for sniffing out phoniness makes him far less vulnerable to her mental miracles. He can’t stop himself from trying to poke holes in her would-be facade, but the more he prods, the more impenetrable her aura becomes. When Sophie, donning a fetching black beret and red skirt, reads Stanley’s “vibrations” and correctly senses that he once had an uncle who drowned, his jaw hits the floor just as everyone else’s. Could this blue-eyed girl really be the link to the great beyond?

Stanley does eventually let down his guard and stamp Sophie as a legitimate mystic (in a moment best discovered in the film), but his transition from skeptic to believer is handled clumsily. Despite several scenes in which Stanley’s disbelief is abated, the actual turn feels jarringly over-enthusiastic, to the point that you wonder whether or not he’s being facetious as he showers Sophie with praise and apologies for his bull-headedness.

Following Stanley’s epiphany, the film more outwardly takes the form of a Rohmer-ish destination romance. The pairing of Stone and Firth works incredibly well comedically, with the funniness of their barb battles magnified by the discrepancy in age and temperament. Romantically, however, the two don’t fit quite as snugly. When actors successfully sell their attraction to one another, you can almost feel the body heat between them, but here, Stone and Firth come just short of sparking a flame. Their body language isn’t forced, but it does feel a bit labored.

The supporting cast is typically excellent for an Allen production, with Eileen Atkins standing out as Stanley’s compassionate, wise aunt. Also making a mark is Hamish Linklater, playing an enthusiastic young man who follows Sophie around like a puppy, singing her romantic ’20s pop tunes on his ukelele (a sight ten times funnier on screen than it is on paper). The set and costume design is shimmery and glamorously detailed, with the fancy cars and mansions looking so stunning the film blurs the line between period piece and pre-war fantasy.

Magic in the Moonlight isn’t the funniest, best looking, or most enjoyable installment Allen’s oeuvre, but it’s perfectly recommendable and memorable. Like its characters, bathed in wondrous sunlight, the film charms with its words and entices with its good looks, strolling along, tugging at the heartstrings ever so gently.

Magic in the Moonlight trailer

Following the success of Once, director John Carney was afforded a bigger budget and bigger stars to help him in making Begin Again, his follow-up to the eminently popular music-romance mashup. The result is a delightful, breezy movie that’ll please those big on cutesy dramedies with little patience for pretension. The film’s similarities to Once are indisputable, and it’ll be lucky to see half the success of its older brother, but Begin Again will nonetheless hook you with its catchy ditties and irresistible performances.

Carney unabashedly embraces schmaltz with his script, but it’s this uncompromising commitment to sweetness that pushes the film over the hump from sickly sentimental to utterly adorable. Set in New York City, the story revolves around a serendipitous encounter between Dan (Mark Ruffalo), a washed up former record exec, and Greta (Keira Knightly), an English singer-songwriter new to the city. Dan sees Gretta at a bar singing a song called “Step You Can’t Take Back”, a song whose lyrics mirror a near-suicidal experience he had just minutes before. It resonates with him so deeply all he can do is stand there wearing a dopey, drunken smile. Improbability be damned, the film wins us over with a sequence in which Dan imagines the unmanned instruments behind Geta springing to life, laying down the backing instrumentation to her mini pop gem. The film is full of enchanting moments like this, and they’re all as easy to buy into.

Dan’s just been fired from his own record label by his old partner and co-owner (Yasiin Bey), and Greta, a singer who embodies the independent artistry he founded the label on in the first place years ago, is his ticket to regaining control of his career and steering the label back in the right direction after years of relying on no-talent pretty pop stars. Along with a band of musicians plucked from the street, Dan and Greta record an indie pop album in the great outdoors of NYC–in Central Park, on row boats, on rooftops, in alleyways–living out the dreams of every coffee shop musician on earth. The songs, written by Gregg Alexander of “New Radicals” fame (“You only get what you give!”), are beautiful and catchy in the moment, but won’t stick to you like the gripping ballads of Once.

Ruffalo, with his messy beard and generally gruff appearance, is a perfectly likable slob, constantly charming with his self-deprecating, pull-no-punches humor. While Knightly is solid as the sometimes spunky, sometimes brooding Greta, but most impressive is her singing voice, which is actually quite beautiful. Steinfeld is the dark horse of the film, sharing wonderfully earnest father-daughter scenes with Ruffalo, with whom she has nice chemistry.

What adds to the film’s success is that it actually got a few surprises tucked away in its ostensibly predictable plot. While the obvious trajectory for the two protagonists would be for them to fall in love (Carney does toy with this possibility in a tasteful, lovely manner), things prove to be much more complicated than that. Dan’s had a heartbreaking split from his wife (Catherine Keener) and doesn’t know the meaning of “quality time” when it comes to his teenage daughter (Hailee Steinfeld), and Greta’s just been dumped by her boyfriend of five years (Maroon 5’s Adam Levine), who’s been acting like a dick since becoming a famous musician. (Levine’s facial hair grows throughout the movie to ridiculous lengths, the humor of which is addressed in witty banter between he and Knightly, a nice comedic touch.) Too often do likeminded rom-coms lose their luster due to rote plot mechanics, but Begin Again sidesteps this pitfall, with its characters winding up in slightly different, bittersweet places than you might expect.

Begin Again champions the principles of loyalty over money and realness over fakery, though it flirts with hokey Hollywood manipulativeness so often it almost shoots itself in the foot. It ultimately passes the authenticity test with flying colors, however, due to strong, heartfelt performances and well-written tunes that dovetail perfectly into and out of Carney’s script. It won’t change anyone’s life or be heralded as a modern romance classic, but Begin Again is a fine, good-natured movie perfectly tailored for light summer viewing.

Begin Again trailer

The sheer ambition on display in Third Person, from Crash writer-director Paul Haggis, is staggering and admirable without question. It’s actually a very, very rare thing to behold, with Haggis carefully constructing an intricately woven ensemble love story set in three famous cities with just a hint of supernatural mystery blanketing the entire thing. Despite the film feeling earnest and being a clear labor of love, it also manages to feel absolutely wrong in so many ways that it’s quite painful to sit through. Haggis had a beautiful vision in mind, but the elements used to deliver it from his brain to ours are, frankly, unsightly.

Liam Neeson leads the ensemble of A-listers in the tri-story drama, starring as a Pulitzer Prize-winning writer who’s struggling desperately with writer’s block while piecing together his latest novel in an extravagant hotel room in Paris. This battle with creation is one of the film’s two major themes, the other being the unmerciful nature of love and longing. Representing love’s viciousness for Neeson is Olivia Wilde, who plays his nutty mistress staying in a suite a couple floors below his.

Their story line consists of them alternating between them being comically cruel to each other and hysterically in love, having wild sex at the drop of a hat. Nothing about their relationship feels authentic, believable, or natural, with them pinball-ing from brutal to enamored way too quickly to take seriously. Yes, there are couples in real life who have similar up-and-down, abusive relationships, but Wilde and Neeson’s relationship is so hammy, desensitizing, and exhausting you’ll want to take a nap. They’re just not relatable enough to make investment in them worthwhile. The pair’s acting does have energy, however, and in isolated moments they’re quite magnetic.

More interesting is a second love story involving Adrien Brody, playing an American in Rome who’s so unimpressed with the city all he wants is a burger, which he waltzes into a pub called Bar Americano to find, but with no luck. Instead, he meets a beautiful gypsy (Moran Atias), the first thing he’s found in Rome he actually likes (though he claims the shot of limoncello they share to be the first as a pick-up line). His attraction to her is so strong that he’s compelled to help her when her daughter’s life is threatened and she must come up with ransom money somehow. This is easily the most enjoyable strand of the three stories, as it mixes elements of danger and betrayal with Brody and Atias’ potent chemistry. It also heavily recalls the work of Antonioni (one of Haggis’ favorites) in a good way.

Mila Kunis leads the third story as a hotel maid in New York entrenched in a custody battle over her son with a cold-hearted painter played by a vacant James Franco. Kunis’ character is positioned to be the film’s most sympathetic, with everyone in her life having zero belief in her, but again, the obtuse way in which her plight is presented derails it early on. The final showdown between she and Franco is as overblown and numbing as the climactic gunshot in Crash.

The supernatural element I mentioned earlier comes in the form of Haggis interconnecting the three stories when they couldn’t possibly be, as they take place thousands of miles apart. We see Kunis, who’s supposed to be in New York, clean up Neeson’s Paris hotel room, for instance. The revelation that makes sense of all this is clever and actually ties in to the film’s themes nicely, but by the time we get there we’re so depleted it barely leaves an impression.

Third Person trailer

Writer-director Paul Haggis (Crash, In the Valley of Elah) spoke with us in San Francisco about his new film, Third Person, which follows three interlocking stories of love, taking place in New York, Paris, and Rome. A labor of love, the script took two and a half years to complete, with Haggis writing and re-writing the intricately woven story incessantly. The film stars Liam Neeson, Mila Kunis, Adrien Brody, James Franco, Kim Basinger, Moran Atias, and Olivia Wilde.

In Part 1 of our video interview, Haggis speaks with us about the nature of love, his love for flawed characters, the selfishness of artists, the painful process of writing the script, the influence of Blow-Up, and more.

WATCH OUR PAUL HAGGIS INTERVIEW PART 2

Based on the wildly popular John Greene novel, The Fault in Our Stars, directed by Josh Boone, has a can’t-fail combination of gifted, pretty, rising young stars and an invincibly sympathetic, sob-inducing story of big dreams and heartache that will, without a doubt, draw piles and piles of money into the laps of all involved in the production. Many a skeptic cinephile will find themselves approaching the film with folded arms, expecting a manipulative tearjerker expertly designed to appeal to the teen idol masses. The film is, in fact, every bit a product of the Hollywood cheese factory, but it offers much more than that; it’s bravely earnest, self-aware, crafted with care, and undeniably life-affirming.

“Depression is not a side effect of cancer. Depression is a side effect of dying.” It’s biting remarks like these, spoken by Shailene Woodley as plucky 16-year-old cancer patient Hazel Grace, that elevate the film high above manufactured YA mediocrity. Hazel’s lived with metastatic thyroid cancer (which mostly affects her lungs) for the larger part of her life, dragging around an oxygen tank with a tube fed to her nose at all times. She refuses to pity herself, a quality so endearing it isn’t fair. She’s mostly concerned with how her imminent fate will affect her sweet parents (Laura Dern and Sam Trammell) than she is afraid of leaving this world. At once cynical and compassionate, witty and self-deprecating, Hazel Grace is irresistible.

Hazel acquires a persistent admirer at a cancer support group named Augustus Waters (Ansel Elgort), a brazen, unstoppably confident young man who pops cigarettes in his mouth but never lights them. Augustus (Gus for short), though in remission, lost a leg to disease, so he keeps the thing that could kill him hanging from his lips, but never gives it the power to do its dirty work. “A metaphor,” he proudly calls the strange habit through an impish grin. Yes, Gus should be incredibly annoying, but he’s not. This is because Elgort, like Woodley, is so charismatic you’ll pretty much buy whatever he’s selling, including an unlit cigarette.

A problem with most young actors is that they tend to be given dialogue that their intellect isn’t mature enough to support. They say all these smart, insightful things, but you can see on their face that they frankly don’t fully understand the weight of what they’re talking about. Woodley and Elgort are gifted in that they exude intelligence, thoughtfulness, and savvy, making smart dialogue sound smart, the corniest lines sound terribly romantic and natural.

Shortly after they meet at the support group, Hazel asks Gus why he’s staring at her. He answers: “Because you’re beautiful.” Typing that made me cringe. But watching the scene unfold, you see the utter conviction and sincerity in Elgort’s eyes, Woodley lets out a small, nervous laugh, and amazingly…you smile. They’ve got you, those damn kids. Then, as Gus turns to say goodbye to another girl from the group, Woodley almost inaudibly mutters, “…I’m not beautiful.” Perfect timing. The heart melts.

For a while, Hazel and Gus swirl around each other in a whirlwind teen fantasy, flirting, texting, and charming each other to pieces. When Hazel is invited to Amsterdam by Van Houten (Willem Dafoe), her favorite author, she’s overwhelmed with excitement, but her dream escapes her when her mom, full of regret, breaks the news that they simply don’t have enough money to make the trip. Dern is absolutely wonderful, filling every frame she occupies with love and acceptance. Hazel’s dream is saved by Gus, who uses his last wish (granted by the Genie wish foundation) to fly them to Amsterdam where they indeed meet the famed author. The interaction is an unexpectedly intense watershed moment, with the young actors playing beautifully off of the seasoned Dafoe.

Woodley’s role is a colorful one, covering a wide spectrum of emotions, and she wears every iota of them on her face. She can make you laugh with a simple raised eyebrow, or make you sob with a subtle quiver of the lip. Her talent is beyond her years, which is fitting, as Hazel is forced to face more trauma before her 18th year than most people do in a lifetime. The physical torment endured by Hazel due to her condition are conveyed excellently, and the danger of her lungs failing is always lingering in the back of your mind, defining the stakes.

Elgort is suave and super-cool as you’d expect, but his looks are pleasantly pedestrian; he’s handsome no doubt, but he also looks like your everyday teen with his puffy Nikes and thrift store leather jackets. When he leans in and says, “I’m in love with you, Hazel Grace,” he doesn’t blink, doesn’t shake. He means what he says, and we feel it.

The film is less about the sadness of cancer than it is about the wry skepticism and wild energy of teenagers. Being a teen is a beautifully flawed experience on its own, but Hazel and Gus’ poise in the face of doom makes their story all the more inspiring and memorable. The film’s ending, while predictably tragic, doesn’t define the experience. Yes, it’s manipulative, and yes, tears will be shed by the bucketful. But what will stick with you is the strong chemistry between the young lovebirds, which is the greatest victory for any romance movie. Color me impressed.

The Fault in Our Stars trailer

After an evocative opening credit sequence featuring warm, grainy 8mm footage of old buildings in New York City that harkens back to the ’70s “director’s era”, Fading Gigolo locks its gaze on a charming book shop. Murray (Woody Allen), the owner of the soon-to-be-closing shop, suggests (in a fidgety, roundabout way that’s classic Allen) to his friend and employee Fioravante (John Turturro), that they enter a pimp-prostitute partnership to make some much-needed dough, Fioravante is audibly trepidatious, but barely flinches at the preposterous offer. He barely flinches at anything really, as is demonstrated in the rest of the film: his default reaction to any situation is a melancholy, almost expressionless stare.

This sequence is a good indicator of things to come. The well-written, interesting characters populating the film (written and directd by Turturro) seem to flock to Fioravante, with his low-key, knowing, guru-like aura. The problem is, he’s the most uninteresting character of the bunch, making the film feel a bit lopsided. Still, it’s an ultimately worthwhile experience. (Woody Allen is John Turturro’s pimp. That’s a priceless setup no matter which way you slice it.)

The film is an earnest, tender take on the world’s oldest profession, steering clear of many tropes of the subgenre and focusing more on the healing properties of the human touch. Fioravante’s new career as a high-end gigolo gets off to a great start, to his surprise. His clients (Sofia Vergara and Sharon Stone among them) gravitate to him because he treats them with respect and a gentle touch, awakening in them something that undeniably feels like love. He’s a natural, and business is booming, with Murray handing out business cards at local hangouts.

When Murray sends an extremely orthodox widow named Avigal (Vanessa Paradis) Fioravante’s way, however, things get more complicated, as he finds himself becoming emotionally attached to the fragile, meek mother of six. Their sessions consist of sensual therapeutic massages that unlock suppressed emotions in both of them. It’s a deeply moving, wordless exchange between the two, beautifully directed and shot by Turturro and DP Marco Pontecorvo. Paradis is a showstopper, conveying tidal waves of emotion with her tiny, porcelain face. Every quiver and lip-bite is captured in extreme close-up, underlining the sensuous nature of the experience.

Noticing a marked improvement in Avigal’s typically sullen complexion is the lovelorn Dovi (Liev Schreiber), a local law-enforcement officer for the Orthodox community who’s been in love with her since they were kids. “I’ve never seen her smile…not like this.” Suspicious, he investigates to discover her regular appointments with Fioravante at his apartment. Dovi utilizes every resource available to him (including Secret Service-like Orthodox agents, which is hilarious) to muck up Murray and Fioravante’s business.

Turturro plays Fioravante in such an understated fashion that he comes across as more detached than quietly perceptive. His ultra-low enthusiasm is too disengaging, to the point where, when he’s talking to the unbelievably funny Murray, he virtually fades into the background (pardon the pun). Yes, the at-arms-length nature of the character is by design, but it feels as though Turturro undershot it.

Allen is the crowning jewel of the film, putting on his best performance on film in years. He’s not doing anything out of the ordinary here–he convulses awkwardly when he doesn’t know what to say, his voice goes up and down like a yo-yo as he stammers, he overthinks everything he says–but the difference here is that he embraces the role Turturro’s writing wholeheartedly, aggressively finding ways to make scenes funnier. He even gets to do some physical comedy: When Dovi’s Hasidic SWAT team apprehends Murray and stuffs him into a car to take him in for questioning, he unexpectedly pops out of the opposite door in a feeble attempt to elude his captors, an attempt thwarted quickly. Precious moments like these are vital.

The plot is ridiculous, but the absurdity of it a.l is easily forgiven thanks to Turturro’s disciplined skills as a filmmaker. Many scenes shine, all of them involving either Allen or Paradis. What makes Fading Gigolo unique is its sensitivity toward the female perspective, representing hooking in a positive light as an emotionally therapeutic practice. There’s too much distance between us and Fioravante, however, for the film to go down as a seminal work.

Fading Gigolo trailer

Nick Frost, best known as Simon Pegg’s tubby partner in crime in the “Cornetto Trilogy” (Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz, The World’s End), casts his own shadow in Cuban Fury, an amiable dance-infused rom-com that dazzles and charms despite missing a step or two. The film is far from forgettable though, as Frost has the balls to execute virtually every on-screen dance move himself, sometimes to breathtaking results. He carries the torch of romantic leading man well as Bruce Garrett, a faded teenage salsa prodigy who reignites his passion for dance in hopes of sweeping his dream girl (Rashida Jones) off her feet.

Directed by James Griffiths, the zero-to-hero tale begins with a young Bruce, in his prime as a salsa champion, pushed out of the world of dance by his peers after a bullying altercation. He hangs up his dancing shoes and extinguishes his burning passion for salsa himself, screaming to his mentor Ron Parfitt (Ian McShane) that “Salsa is for pussies!” Jump to twenty five years later, and Bruce, now an industrial engineer, is still playing doormat to bullies, particularly his crass, relentlessly narcissistic co-worker Drew (Chris O’Dowd).

He’s shed all of the confidence he once exuded on the dance floor, now a fat, pushover pencil-pusher whose all but given up on romantic endeavors. Enter his new boss Julia (Jones), a pretty American who loves dancing salsa (what a coincidence!) and catches the eye of both Bruce and his skinny nemesis Drew. Bruce, a shell of his former flashy-shirt-wearing self, tracks down aging hard-ass Ron to help him reclaim his former glory and get his husky hips gyrating again.

Frost has always been likable as a goofy dunderhead, but he shows range here as the mild-mannered Bruce. He’s an utterly convincing romantic lead and sweet chemistry with Jones. He lets his co-stars shine as the comedic standouts, with O’Dowd firing on all cylinders, being as vulgar and despicable as possible as delusional ladies-man Drew. Stealing the show handily however is Kayvan Novak, who plays the fiery Bejan, one of Bruce’s muscly dance buddies. The effervescent Novak could have easily been written off as a rote gay stereotype, but he manages to conjure some genuine tenderness in his scenes with Frost (a hilarious head-to-toe makeover scene comes to mind). McShane’s talents aren’t squandered, but they’re not even close to being fully utilized.

The film’s biggest issue is that one of the three sides of the love triangle is woefully weak. We’re meant to fear that Julia could possibly end up with Drew, but O’Dowd is too obnoxious and off-putting to ever come across as a threat. Julia clearly has warm affection for Bruce and clearly has zero attraction to Drew. There’s absolutely nothing about her character that suggests a Julia-Drew romance is ever even remotely in the cards. Nothing. This lack of any real threat dampens any sense of urgency in Bruce’s pursuit, though Griffiths tries really hard to sell us on it.

The real joy of the film are the dance sequences, all of which don’t hide the fact that Frost is actually pulling the moves off himself. They don’t highlight this fact either, however, as Griffiths’ camera cuts too much to allow us to take in the full routines. Frost doesn’t move like a pro exactly, but damned if he doesn’t come closer than anyone would have thought. Helping him look good is the bright costuming by Rosa Dias, which adorns the big man with sequins, shiny shoes, and form-fitting silk shirts. The choreography by Richard Marcel is spectacular and pushes Frost to the limit, and a slapstick car-park dance-off between Bruce and Drew, which garners big laughs, is surprisingly thrilling and well thought-out. Despite the romantic element’s failure to launch, Cuban Fury is solid entertainment, will put smiles on faces, and announces Frost as a viable leading man.

Cuban Fury trailer

Love and Demons opens with San Francisco-based writer-director J.P. Allen, playing a demon named “Mister D.”, addressing the camera directly, delivering a chilling monologue, assessing the lives of mortals like you and I from a devil’s-eye view. “Let me tell you a little story. The story of your life.” It’s a striking, statement for Allen to open up his film with, and he does it with utter confidence. He’s asking us to participate in the experience up front, and the frankness of it all sets the stage for an inventive, devilishly playful romantic comedy that breaks the mold and overcomes its paltry budget.

We follow an unnamed couple (Chris Pflueger and Lucia Frangione) who live in San Francisco and are under a lot of domestic and financial stress. Addressing us directly, just as Mister D. did, the man tells us of hallucinations he’s been having lately, of another man (Mister D.) stalking him in his home who asks him to meet in the park. (Allen places himself in the blurred out background of the shot behind the man, a nice touch.)

Once Mister D. convinces the man that he isn’t a hallucination at all, he begins to manipulate him into turning against his lover, planting seeds of suspicion and doubt. The woman gets a demon of her own, played by Arnica Skulstad Brown, who counters Mister D’s scheme by feeding the woman’s paranoia as well. Watching the demons prod at their respective pawns and try to outmaneuver each other with their silver tongues is entirely entertaining, and the actors clearly relish the opportunity to be open and playful with the material.

Aside from Allen, whose delivery is spot-on (he’s clearly loving every minute of screen time), the actors aren’t going to wow anyone with their performances. But the great thing is that the surrealist, cheeky material doesn’t require any more of them. Allen is a filmmaker of conviction and bravado, using simple editing tricks and flourishes (like quick flashes of a gun being cocked or a filter that floods the screen in red and makes the actors look hand-drawn) with complete confidence. He’s having fun, and it’s hard not to be won over by his enthusiasm.

The plot isn’t constructed particularly well, but the film’s style oozes and masks it well. The film’s final standoff, which is eluded to early on, is probably the least effective moment, disappointingly. Though the film’s exuberant editing is a treat, the actual camerawork–the movement, the framing–leaves a lot to be desired.

Sexy, mischievous, and provocative, Love and Demons is a singular moviegoing experience in that it engages us directly, breaking the 4th wall and creating a sense of immediacy and interactivity typically reserved for the theater. It’s hard to pull off on screen, but Allen infuses the film with so much attitude that he makes it work. This is a San Francisco production from top to bottom and is playing for a one week run starting tonight at the city’s Opera Plaza Cinema. Don’t miss it if you’re in the area.

The Face of Love has a premise that would prove a challenging sell for any filmmaker. Annette Bening plays a widow named Nikki who, five years after the death of her husband Garrett (Ed Harris), sees a man who looks like him at a museum. Exactly like him, in fact. The sight of the handsome doppelgänger intoxicates her with both fear and ecstasy, and she feels compelled to stalk him around Los Angeles.

Now, this can either be read as the behavior of a mad woman, or the behavior of a woman tragically chasing the ghost of her lost love. Either way, it’s completely absurd, but a good filmmaker can make it work, make us suspend our disbelief and buy into Nikki’s dark fantasy. Director Arie Posin doesn’t make it work, but he comes close, mostly thanks to his leads, both great actors. Without their talents, the film–with its momentum-less, scrambled script and pedestrian camerawork–would shatter into a million pieces.

When Nikki finally tracks down Garrett’s double, a man named Tom (Harris again, obviously) who teaches painting at Occidental College, and talks to him face to face, she’s hit with a tidal wave of emotion that floors her. (Bening is wonderful in this moment, writhing in pain, disbelief, and joy, as if she’s standing inches from the sun.) Predictably, she finds herself gravitating toward him, and him to her, and they fall into a relationship, though Nikki mentions nothing of Tom’s uncanny resemblance to her dear Garrett.

Is this a morally compromising pairing? At least on Nikki’s end of things, it seems to be teetering on the edge. One can easily see why she’s fallen for Tom, and besides him looking like Garrett, he actually seems like a sweet, good-hearted man. But it’s a clearly indefensible decision to not tell him that he looks just like her dead husband. She even tells him that Garrett dumped her, for some reason. She starts bringing Tom to she and Garrett’s old haunts, an idiotic display that makes no sense. He’s going to find out, you silly lady! Sympathy wanes when we see her make mistakes as dumb as this.

The reveal the film ambles toward is too contrived to generate any real suspense. We can see it coming a mile away, and when it hits–at the site of Garrett’s death, an empty beach in Mexico–it’s underwhelming, and a little weird (Bening and Harris nearly drown in an ocean of melodrama). In an earlier, climactic scene, Nikki’s daughter (Jess Weixler) is floored when she sees Tom, and when she blows up in his face Nikki yells “I need him!”, an allusion to addiction that Bening delivers well, but again feels a bit irksome.

Despite the ridiculousness of the story, it brings up some compelling ideas. How would you react if you met a double of your dead lover? And on the other side of the situation, how would you react if you were Tom and discovered you were the spitting image of your girlfriend’s dead husband? The moral implications of the scenario are intriguing, but this kind of love story is incredibly hard to buy into. Hitchcock did it in Vertigo, which The Face of Love resembles in more ways than one, but Posin struggles here.

Robin Williams plays Nikki’s jealous neighbor, who’s been asking her out for years but keeps getting shoved back into the friend zone. He’s little more than a plot device, but he makes the most of it, just like the two leads. Though most of us would turn and run in his situation, Harris makes us believe that he’s truly falling for this woman, despite her erratic, suspicious behavior. Bening has some fantastic moments (mostly in the first half of the film, before all logic goes out the window), and her chemistry with Harris is expectedly dynamic.

The Face of Love has the ingredients of a good film: terrific actors, a thought-provoking premise, and a capable director at the helm. But what sours the pot is the film’s script, which tells the story in such a meandering, unfocused fashion that the film loses us as the character’s actions descend into nonsensicality. Still, it’s hard not to be at least a little invested when you’ve got such incredible actors playing off each other on screen.

In Arie Posin’s The Face of Love, we follow a widow named Nikki (Annette Bening) who meets a man named Tom (Ed Harris) who looks, impossibly, exactly like her dead husband. Memories of her husband come rushing back to her as she and Tom start a relationship. Is she falling in love with Tom, or falling in love with her husband all over again? The film also stars Robin Williams and Jess Weixler.

Director/co-writer Posin chatted with us about working with Bening and Harris, how the film is inspired by his mother, paying homage to Vertigo, making Los Angeles romantic again, and more.

The Face of Love opens this Friday in San Francisco and is playing now in select cities.

You have two incredible collaborators manning your lead roles. As a director and storyteller, what was it like having such seasoned talents at your disposal?

Arie: It was a gift, a joy. The summer that I spent editing this movie was the best summer I’ve had maybe ever. It was a season of pure joy. On set they’re just so true and authentic, take after take. I feel like my job on set is to be kind of a firs line lie detector. Do I believe what I’m seeing? Do I believe the emotions? In the editing room, you can see that there were 5, 6, 7 takes that are all true and identical in their believability, but they’re also all subtly different. [Annette and Ed] are able to shade things and give you dimensions. It gives me such freedom to shape the movie. But at the same time, the hardest thing to do was to edit, because there are so many wonderful takes.

The story of how the idea for this story came to light is pretty remarkable. It came from your mother, correct?

Arie: Yeah. Years ago, a few years after my dad had passed away, my mother would come over to see me. She said words that are pretty similar to what Annette’s character says in the movie. She said, “A funny thing happened to me today. I was by the museum, in a cross walk on Wilshire Boulevard. I looked up and I saw a man coming towards me who looked like a perfect double of your father.” I said, “What did you do?” and she said, “It shocked me. He had a big smile on his face…and it felt so nice. It felt like it used to.” That’s the story that stuck with me and that I began to obsess, dream, and eventually write about.

I imagine going through something like that, you must feel a little bit crazy inside. What do you think the relationship is between sanity and love?

Arie: I think it’s different for everyone. My thought on it for this movie was, in a sense, that kind of love you have…you know, she spent 30 years with her husband, and she had him ripped away from her violently, tragically, just when they were at this stage where they’re thinking, “What are the two of us going to do together for the rest of our lives?” Seeing someone again who wakes up those feelings would be almost like an addiction. You get a taste, and you want more, despite yourself and despite the fact that it’s a transgressive relationship. It’s a compulsion, an obsession.

In terms of sanity, that was one of the biggest questions for me in writing the script and even throughout production. Annette’s falling in love through the course of the story, but she’s also falling back in love with her late husband. The question is always, she’s on this journey towards madness, but where is she at? How do we chart that? Is she crazy here, not crazy here? And it went back to the story with my mom, which became a real touchstone for us. The truth in that situation is that my mom wasn’t crazy, you know? She wasn’t imagining it. She saw this guy that looked like my dad, and it shook her to her core. I thought it was important that Nikki be sane, but as long as we could bear it. Once she goes mad, the audience becomes an observer of that. But to really participate, I thought it was important for her to be sane, then spiraling eventually into madness, but being able to hold that off as long as possible.

There are obvious similarities between the plot of your film and Vertigo.

Arie: Vertigo is one of my favorite movies. Hitchcock is unquestionably the master. There’s so much film grammar that we take for granted that was first proposed and best used by him. We all owe a lot to him. Having said that, when we wrote the first draft of the script, we set it in a museum because my mom’s story happened at the museum. The best cinematographers ask, “How few lights can I bring to a location in order to catch the naturalness of it?” That’s where the museum came out of. It didn’t come out of trying to do a take on a Vertigo type story. It all evolved from a very natural, organic place. But once we had the first draft and read it, it occurred to us: there’s a double in Vertigo, and there’s a double here. There’s a museum in both. A friend of mine saw the movie last week and said there was more than that. He said, “Well, she jumps into the bay in Vertigo, and she jumps into the ocean in your movie.” There are other movies that we love, and we had to check and make sure that if we were stealing, we we’d be stealing deliberately. (laughs) Another movie we talked about was The Double Life of Veronique. There’s a double there, as well, and it takes this metaphysical look at people who look alike. It’s been done many times.

Although this is a romantic movie, I wanted it to be infused with tension and suspense. The premise doesn’t naturally suggests suspense and tension, and yet I love so many of those movies in the ’40s, ’50s, and ’60s that were romantic but also had a bit of tension. And that’s certainly true of Vertigo.

San Francisco plays a big part in Vertigo, and Los Angeles plays a big part in yours.

Arie: That was something that I was very much inspired by Vertigo about. San Francisco is so much a character in that movie. I’ve fallen in love with Los Angeles, and I wanted it to become a backdrop. I live here, and I feel the romantic side of the city. It’s beautiful, but I haven’t seen it in movies in a long, long time. That was my hope. There was actually a moment when a financier offered to make the movie with us if we shot it in Baton Rouge. We turned it down with hopes of staying in LA and using the city as the backdrop for our story, a character in itself.

What scene are you most proud of?

Arie: One of the most challenging scenes in the movie is the scene where the daughter comes in and discovers that her mom has been in a relationship with a man that looks like her father. From the moment Nikki keeps this secret, the audience is savvy enough to know that the secret is going to come out. The question is how and when, and who’s going to find out. On one level, you want to fulfill that expectation, but on the other hand also make it surprising. In that scene, you have three people in a very hot, violent confrontation, and what I wanted to convey was the three points of view. They’re each coming at it with their own point of view, and I wanted the audience to identify with all three of them. As we bounce around the scene, you know why each person is reacting the way they are, and you can see the story from their perspective. That was a real challenge in the writing, shooting, and editing.

It’s a big scene to carry on your shoulders. I had a director friend of mine say, “It takes some nerve to take potentially the biggest scene in your movie and put it on the shoulders of the least experienced actor in the scene.” On top of that, he said, “If that scene didn’t work, the movie would fall apart.” It was a really critical scene, and Jess (Weixler, who plays the daugher) played it so brilliantly, against two of the best actors that we have.

It’s hard not to like a love story whose lovers are brought together by a home-cooked meal. Make it an Indian home-cooked meal, with aromatic curries and slow-cooked vegetables, and it’s borderline irresistible. Aside from eliciting tummy rumbles, Ritesh Batra’s feature debut, The Lunchbox, is an enticing, melancholy romantic indie about our universal hunger for validation and intimacy.

An anomaly sets our story in motion: in Mumbai, there is a remarkable delivery network made up of “dabbawallahs”, bicycle deliverymen who take hot homemade lunches from housewives to their husbands at work. Despite an antiquated coding system, the dabbawallahs’ error rate is unbelievably low, at an estimated one error per six million deliveries. Batra’s story follows one of those astronomical errors, in which a lunch prepared by Ila (a ravishing Nimrat Kaur) is mistakenly delivered to the desk an aging accountant and widower named Saajan (Iffran Khan, Slumdog Millionaire, Life of Pi) for reasons left unexplained by Batra, giving the coincidence a slight air of magic.

The delicious meal–which Ila lovingly prepared with the guidance of her “auntie” to rekindle her stagnant relationship with her husband– warms Saajan to the core. (He usually gets a ho-hum delivery from a local restaurant.) When Ila catches wind of the mix-ups, she’s compelled to write a note to Saajan, as he consistently sends her stacked-tin food containers back to her empty, the ultimate sign of appreciation.

They begin a pen pal relationship, with their passed notes becoming longer and more personal as the days go by, and they grow to look forward to the notes as a source of joy. They share their deepest secrets with one another and, with each thinking their lives had plateaued, they find that they’ve reawakened the dreamer in one another.

Saajan, on the precipice of retirement, has been aggressively avoiding his pestersome successor, Shaikh, who diligently stalks him around the office, begging Saajan for any piece of advice. (Seeing Saajan’s seething anger when Shaikh successfully hunts him down is hilarious.) But as Ila’s notes begin to soften Saajan’s calloused heart, he begins to open up to Shaikh, and he learns that there’s more to the young man than he thought. Ila’s husband is so emotionally distant it sometimes appears as if he’s looking straight through her. Saajan’s notes give her something to cling to, something mysterious and new.

What drives The Lunchbox is our yearning to see these two characters (excellently acted, by the way) finally meet. The vulnerability and finesse displayed by Khan and Kaur is riveting. Batra’s editing of their written conversations make these scenes feel intimate and electrified, as if there’s no one else in the world but these two. Batra recognizes that the gravitational pull between her characters means everything, and tastefully maintains that tension throughout. The film isn’t as overly sentimental as it may initially seem, with Batra and her actors operating largely on subtlety and undertones. Those hoping for a Hollywood-style resolution will be disappointed, but by keeping the ultimate feel-good moment just out of our reach, Batra makes The Lunchbox a more resonant, alluring piece of romantic storytelling.

Hide Your Smiling Faces

Set in a beautifully photographed forested town in the rural North East, Hide Your Smiling Faces by Daniel Patrick Carbone is a moving, richly atmospheric coming-of-age film in the vein of Terrence Malick. It centers on two young brothers who, following the death of a friend, are forced to come to terms with the bitter taste of mortality, both in their own way. It’s a hauntingly accurate depiction of the dark side of boyhood and puberty. The boys wrestle with overwhelming emotions they don’t have the faculty to contain, and they wrestle with each other as well, literally, in their lush, deep green surroundings. Carbone and DP Nick Bentgen capture the landscape in amazingly composed, majestic shots that serve as the perfect framing for the boys’ bubbling emotions. Performances are good across the board, though the young actors feel more naturalistic and raw than the seasoned adults, whose polished skills feel less appropriate to the material. Highly recommended.

Bluebird

When Lesley (Amy Morton), a good-natured school bus driver, is distracted by a pretty bluebird perched inside her bus, she fails to discover a young boy hiding in a back seat during a routine end-of-the-day check-up. The boy goes into hypothermic shock when he’s left in the freezing cold overnight. Set in a frigid industrial town in Maine, Bluebird follows the families of both the boy and the bus driver as they’re stricken with guilt, grief, and inner turmoil. Morton and Louisa Krause (who plays the boy’s mother) are fantastic, and the supporting cast (including John Slattery, Margo Martindale, Emily Meade, and Louisa Krause) back them up solidly, despite their characters feeling like quickly-sketched small town stereotypes. Despite the horrifying nature of the incident at the center of the drama, the film lacks a sense of urgency or intensity, making it feel emotionally distant. Director-writer Lance Edmands shows promise, however, even though his potential isn’t fully realized here.

Rezeta

Following a free-spirited, 21-year-old Albanian fashion model whose jet-setting lifestyle has brought her to Mexico City, Rezeta is a somewhat messy, but peculiarly charming indie romance film starring talented non-actors. While at first Rezeta (Rezeta Veliu) has fun in her new environment, sleeping around with various handsome men, her romantic side begins to yearn for a more stable relationship. She finds this in a tatted-up punk rocker named Alex (Roger Mendoza), whose shy, bad boy personality draws her in. Rezeta’s flirtatious tendencies begin to form cracks in their relationship, and Alex eventually reaches a breaking point, though Rezeta won’t let him slip away without a fight. Director-writer Fernando Frias has an ear for naturalistic dialog, and he pulls good performances out of his actors. He makes Mexico City look as colorful and vibrant as Rezeta’s personality.

Congratulations!

Writer-director Mike Brune’s nutty missing-person drama Congratulations! will appeal to those who enjoy films about the stranger side of suburbia, like Blue Velvet or Quentin Dupieux’s Wrong, which played at Indiefest last year. When an 8-year-old boy named Paul mysteriously disappears during a house party, Mr. and Mrs. Gray (Robert Longstreet and Rhoda Griffis) are left frozen in a state of utter confusion. To the rescue comes Detective Dan Skok (John Curran), who believes that there is “no such thing as a missing person; only missing information”. All evidence points to Paul still being somewhere in the Gray family home, so Dan takes up residence, incessantly searching for clues, driven by the nagging memory of a similar case. As everyone’s mind begins to unwind, their behavior, including Skok’s, grows more bizarre by the minute. Brune conjures some deliciously weird shots (the image of the entire house covered in missing person posters is unforgettable), and the film’s pacing is spot-on. The cast is constantly, constantly deadpanning, which is hilarious at times, grating at others.

Set in the streets of Havana (though it was filmed in Puerto Rico), Antonio Hens’ The Last Match is a seamlessly plotted story of two young men who develop a lust for one another, despite both being involved in long-term, heterosexual relationships prior. There’s a lot to be desired when it comes to Hens’ style,  and in terms of exploring the shaky dynamic between closeted males and their macho, agro father figures, it feels like we’ve been down this road before. But the story is affecting nonetheless, with a fine cast that sells the drama and keeps it engaging from start to finish. There’s nary a wasted moment, and though Hens’ take on the subject matter is somewhat unremarkable, the storytelling is rock-solid. The film opens in Landmark Theaters this Friday in San Francisco and Miami.

Yosvani’s (Milton Garcia) living situation is pretty sweet: he lives with his fiancee Gema (Beatriz Mendez) and her father, Silvano (Luis Alberto Garcia) free of rent, a far cry from his soccer team friend, Rei (Reinier Diaz), an essentially destitute, handsome fellow who lives with his wife (Jenifer Rodriguez) and her badgering mother (Mirtha Ibarra). Rei scrounges for cash by selling his body to tourists late at night (an endeavor unsettlingly encouraged by his mother-in-law), while Yosvani lives ever under the thumb of the imposing tough-guy Silvano, who deals in the black market. Disenchanted with their home lives, it begins to dawn on them that they’re much happier when they’re around each other, at soccer practice or at the local discotheque. After a late night at the club, they share a kiss as Ysovani drops Rei off at his doorstep, eliciting both confusion and curiosity in the inexperienced Ysovani.

With romance awakened, Rei and Yosvani duck into bathrooms and rooftops to make love, keeping their affair secret from not only their significant others, but from their abrasive in-laws, particularly Silvano, who’s liable to react destructively should he find them out. Rei’s soccer skills land him a shot at competing at a pro level which, like almost every other aspect of his life, doesn’t jibe with his relationship with Yosvani. When Rei’s night prospects dry up, he’s digs himself into debt with the suspicious Silvano (of all people), which puts he and Yosvani in a precarious position that escalates into dangerous territory.

The way Yosvani’s attraction evolves into a sort of possessive obsession is delivered well by Garcia, who hits every beat with precision. Diaz isn’t as charming as he is good-looking, but he plays well off of Garcia and exudes subtle sensuality as opposed to broad sexuality. The sex scenes are tasteful yet realistic, and Hens handles every scene with the same measure of authenticity and respect.

In fact, the entire production feels pitch-perfect, from the pacing, to the photography, to the acting, to the writing. Everything serves the story well, but therein lies the problem: the story and its themes (forbidden love, desperation, broken dreams) feel too familiar to be memorable. It all feels a little safe, like Hens was afraid to take any risks. Aside from a pulse-pounding, skillfully staged home invasion sequence and an odd final image, it’s hard to think of any moments that are uniquely stimulating or extraordinary. This may be a case of a filmmaker showing too much restraint for his own good, but The Last Match is nevertheless crafted with care and consistently interesting, which is more than respectable.