Director: Gillian Robespierre
Writer: Gillian Robespierre
Cast: Jenny Slate, Jake Lacy, Gaby Hoffman, Gave Liedman, David Cross, Richard Kind, Polly Draper
Runtime: 84 mins.
2014
"It was nice to be able to enjoy a comedy movie all the way through without once feeling uncomfortable about its treatment of women."
So said one of the friends with whom I saw Obvious Child. Can you imagine that? If every single comedy film you watched made you feel not only uncomfortable, but personally attacked? As if the movie is having a joke at your expense, and you're not invited to laugh? You would have to go into every comedy film with a certain amount of trepidation, or at least wariness. You would feel like you need to become expert at shrugging it off so as not to be the wet blanket of the post-movie discussion of best lines and funniest moments; you would fail at shrugging it off.
I'm not saying that's how it is for everybody, but it's the status quo for a whole lot of women who watch comedies. Luckily there are exceptions. And if I feel like Obvious Child is a breath of fresh air, I can't even conceive how fresh and funny it must feel to its female audience.
This review is split into three parts: the What, the Who, and the How.
1. The What
Obvious Child is an indie-flavored romantic comedy about personal expression and growing up and all sorts of other rich thematic materials. It's also about abortion.
Donna Stern (Jenny Slate) is a raunchy and not-particularly-successful comedian whose life is about to get a lot more not-particularly-successful. Over the course of one day she loses her boyfriend (to a blonde mutual friend) and she loses her job (at a really hip independent bookstore). We see her cope with the help of her bestie, Nellie (Gaby Hoffman). It's sad, but mostly funny. Then one night she meets a cute guy at the bar where she performs. His name is Max (Jake Lacy) and he's the sweet, kind, bashful, straight-laced foil to Donna's brash, raunchy, in-your-face charisma. Anyway, they have a rather fun night together. As you may have guessed, Donna soon discovers that she is pregnant. The rest of the movie explores Donna's emotional state as she processes the pregnancy, feels out where she stands with Jake, and receives emotional support from her friend Nellie and her separated parents, Nancy and Jacob (Polly Draper and Richard Kind, respectively).
I had a moment near the end of the film when I realized it would be wrapping up soon, and I was surprised. I was so invested in the experience of the movie that my sense of time was warped, giving me the impression that we were just getting started. That's an impressive thing for a movie to accomplish--think of how few times movies pass by in a flash, compared to all the instances of movies dragging along interminably.
I mention this because Obvious Child is a romantic comedy, but does not play into traditional romantic comedy plot and character arcs. Normally these arcs are what propel us through a movie, but Obvious Child achieves that propulsion through charisma and emotional honesty rather than plot movement. Generally movies with such a nontraditional structure alienate the audience, or else revel in their meandering, as we see in aimless mumblecore films like Drinking Buddies. I'll talk about this more in section three, but somehow Obvious Child achieves the best of both worlds.
Perhaps more remarkable is the line the movie straddles in terms of its subject matter. Regardless of your politics, I hope it's apparent how thoughtful and respectful Obvious Child is. Sure it has an agenda--every movie does. But it manages to avoid being polemical or pushing propaganda in favor of telling a heartfelt story about a well-drawn person.
Rather than embarrassing myself by going on about something I know nothing about (I have very little experience with movies about abortion... or romantic comedies at all... or comedies in general, really), I'll point you to this (brief!) article about the cinematic context of abortion. Give it a quick read, it does a good job of touching on the history of abortion in film, and pointing out why Obvious Child feels fresh and different:
Can Abortion Be Funny?
2. The Who
You can't talk about why this movie succeeds without talking about the cast. First of all, kudos to director Gillian Robespierre for bringing out the best from her actors. This movie thrives on its performances--in fact, it depends on their ability to break the cliches that we're so used to in the indie and romantic comedy genres. I'm thinking of Donna's friends, Nellie and Joey (Gabe Liedman). Joey is set up to be the cliche of the flamboyantly gay friend, and his character falls well within the range of that cliche's associated stereotypes. Yet Joey still manages to come off as a real person through sheer force of performance (and some top-notch dialogue). Meanwhile, Gaby Hoffman pulls off Nellie's supportive friend role with aplomb. She could have so easily become a thoughtless boy-bashing echo chamber, but instead she manages to offer Donna complete support while still maintaining a fair and mature approach to the issues at hand. Their friendship lives in the gravitas that Hoffman lends to the role.
Perhaps more impressive is Jake Lacy as the straight-lacy'd Max. More than anyone else, this character could have been completely ruined by a mediocre--or even slightly above average--performance. Basically, he's a dweeb. An aw-shucks down-home kind of guy. Usually this sort of genuine innocence is insufferable onscreen, especially when juxtaposed with the opposite energy of Jenny Slate. When Max asks to take Donna out on a proper date, or brings her flowers, we expect to cringe. But Lacy plays the role with such quiet charisma and likability that we can't help but love the wide-eyed lug.
Time to talk about Jenny Slate. She's kind of the best.
Actually, I have no idea how to talk about Jenny Slate. This is the kind of powerhouse performance that doesn't draw attention to itself, and instead attempts the much more difficult task of making you believe you are watching a real life, fully formed, and psychologically complex person. Instead of just describing that sort of magic, I arbitrarily found a clip for you.
The clip is very conversational. This banter is pretty typical of the kind of energy and humor that pervades the movie. But watch Slate's face in the moments after her character says, "...and I'm going to get an abortion." Watch how her face falls and she sinks into herself, for just a few moments, in a way that's not telegraphed to her conversation partners. Even as she's listening to Joey, she is having a private moment as she lets the weight of her own declaration set in. Then, because she's the ever-ready comedian, she snaps back into social mode to fire a one-liner back at Joey. It's the best kind of understated drama.
For an actor we mostly know from television shows (Parks and Rec, Bob's Burgers) and the infamous youtube clip MARCEL THE SHELL WITH SHOES ON, she shows some serious movie star chops here. Which makes me wonder about her level of success. This may be tangential, but I recently stumbled upon a video of her on an internet show called Getting Doug with High. This is a show where Doug gets high with famous people. This is a thing that exists on youtube. As I watched a bit of it, I was struck by the realization that a movie star like Tom Cruise or Angelina Jolie or probably even Steve Carell could never go on a show like this because of the controversy that would follow. But Jenny Slate is just not-famous-enough to fly under the radar. Isn't that a weird double standard? At any rate, I'm guessing that Slate's current position as famous-but-not-too-famous allows her to do subversive work that she couldn't accomplish otherwise, and Obvious Child feels like a testament to that.
3. The How
The day before her scheduled abortion, about three quarters of the way through the movie, Donna stands in a restroom looking at a mirror, preparing herself for a comedy performance. Nellie approaches her to offer up support, and they exchange this snippet of dialogue (which is from my memory, so is probably inexact):
"You're going to kill it."
"No. That's tomorrow."
With that, they share a laugh. Does that exchange feel callous or inappropriate to you? It sure seems like it. But you'll have to trust me when I say that at this point in the film, with all the context and characterization that has preceded it, the moment feels not only hilarious, but also poignant. Running parallel to our reaction of, "Did she just make an abortion joke?" is the realization that, "Of course she just made an abortion joke--that's who this person is, and how she copes, and how she connects." It's a stirring, heartwarming moment.
It's also a moment that bespeaks this movie's remarkable approach to comedy. I want to take this opportunity to address the whole "Can women be as funny as men?" issue that has been rearing its head recently, especially in film. This conversation achieved widespread prominence around the release of Bridesmaids. On the one hand, it's a ridiculous question that I barely feel the need to address--the answer is Yes. On the other hand, it brings up some interesting issues. After all, despite a game performance, does anyone say that Christina Applegate's character in Anchorman is their favorite? Could a woman achieve Jim Carrey's manic bombast in movies like The Mask or Ace Ventura, or would it feel disingenuous? Doesn't everyone who watches Iron Man give Gwyneth Paltrow kudos for "keeping up with Robert Downey Jr."? Not helping is the release of a movie like Tammy, in which Bridesmaids darling Melissa McCarthy gets to make the movie she wants to make--and fills it with fat jokes and uneven characters. As if that's all she's capable of.
That was a depressing paragraph. I had to write it out, though, so that I could turn it on its head. My argument is that maybe a Christina Applegate could never compete with Will Ferrell on his own turf. But that's because Anchorman is a male-driven movie with a male comedy ethos. Of course, that doesn't mean females can't enjoy it. But I suspect a female-driven comedy feels a lot different. I suspect it feels like Obvious Child.
Think about the overarching style of the Ferrell-Apatow-Rogen-Carrey brand of comedy. Putting aside the oft-encountered overt sexism, we see films that are male-driven, often about male companionship (The Hangover, Step Brothers), featuring characters who are over-the-top in their theatricality, and presented with obvious layers of irony slathered on top. These zany men are often paired with women who act as the "straight man" (hah) in the scenario, offering judgment, or perhaps just a sense of normalcy that the ma(i)n characters defy.
Take a step back and look at that model. Of course there are so few great female comedic performances to point at in mainstream comedy. There's no space for that to happen.
Not that there's anything wrong with that model in and of itself. I think it's a good model when played well (I love Anchorman). But we need to make room for competing models that allow women to offer more of a female-infused ethic of comedy. I believe Obvious Child is a model for that model. No less raunchy than its masculine peers, Obvious Child achieves the same level of hilarity through sincerity and honesty rather than layers upon layers of irony and absurdity. Just as Step Brothers humorously deconstructs the male psyche, Obvious Child does so for the female--they just approach their tasks from opposite directions.
Rather than complaining that women can't be as funny as men, we need to support the existence of movies that give women a platform to achieve the kind of cutting comedy that their perspective allows. Obvious Child gets it right. No male-driven comedy that I've seen has been as sensitive and real as what Robespierre and Slate give us. This is fresh filmmaking, and I hope it's a trendsetter.
3.5 / 5 BLOBS
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