Review: The Meyerowitz Stories (New and Selected)

The Meyerowitz Stories (New and Selected): Written and directed by Noah Baumbach.  Starring: Adam Sandler, Ben Stiller, Elizabeth Marvel, Dustin Hoffman, Emma Thompson, and Grace van Patten.  Running Time: 112 minutes. 

Rating: 3/4

            Noah Baumbach has spent his film career slowly turning himself into a master at taking incredibly immature characters, often set within tragicomically dysfunctional families, and spinning out remarkable tales make us really feel for the hilariously inept people we see.  We identify with them because they reflect so much of what is both pathetically and, at the same time, sweetly flawed in ourselves.  In this regard, his new Netflix-produced work The Meyerowitz Stories fits right in to his typical framework, and is a worthy successor to Frances Ha and Mistress America, even if it doesn’t quite reach the same heights those works did. 

           

            The authorial nature of the title refers to the broken-up structure of the film itself.  Instead of a smoothly connecting narrative, we only see scenes and snippets of the intersecting lives of the royally fucked-up Meyerowitz clan, identifiable by the title cards separating the segments focused on a particular character.  These “chapters,” after a fashion, take us through a series of events that bring together the disparate members of the family, which include the aging father, Harold (Dustin Hoffmann), his alcoholic fourth wife Maureen (Emma Thomson), his three children from his three previous wives- Danny, Matthew, and Jean (Adam Sandler, Ben Stiller, and Elizabeth Marvel)- and Danny’s college-bound daughter, Eliza (Grace Van Patten). 

            Centered primarily around a health scare that, briefly, has everyone convinced Harold is finally about to die, one Pandora’s Box after another of unresolved mental problems, unhealthy family dynamics, and traumas is opened up and the horrors within unleashed.  Driven by the wholly self-centered attitude of their father, each of the children have clearly spent years finding their own ways to bottle up their angers, insecurities, and fears, but when the final specter of Death reveals itself, they suddenly find there’s no hiding to be had anymore. 

            Dustin Hoffman’s Harold, an aging sculpture, is the biggest scene-chewer and scene-stealer of the whole affair.  He embodies, in so many ways, the stereotypical narcissistic, narrow-minded “artist” taken to a miserable extreme.  He talks and rambles and gets angry about everyone and everything.  If you aren’t able to appreciate “the work” (his way of referring to his artistic career) you aren’t worth his time, so fuck off.  I was a bit bothered by this at first- his long-winded explanations of EVERYTHING and his incessant jumping from one topic to another at the drop of a pin come off at first like lazy exposition on the part of the screenplay- but it soon becomes clear how central this is to his character.  Harold can’t NOT keep talking about this and that, complaining and bemoaning that and this, because to pause for long enough might force him to accept that, just maybe, he was never that great an artist to begin with, and he’s not as famous as his peers for a reason. 

            As excellent as Dustin Hoffman is, though- and this is the best performance he’s given us in years- the cast is astoundingly good across the board.  Adam Sandler and Ben Stiller (Older Brother Danny and Younger Brother Matthew), much like Will Ferrell, are odd cases of actors; they’ve always specialized in comedy, yet I’ve nearly always found them far more interesting and, well, better in their non-comedic projects.  Ben Stiller has been good in a lot of movies before (I seem to be one of the only people left alive who recalls the underrated Walter Mitty), but this is easily one of his best roles.  Adam Sandler has never been better, period. 

            For all the outlandishness the Meyerowitz people display, this movie thrives on those subtle moments that reveal what lies beneath the surface of each person.  Matthew talks often about how he’s managed to get over his issues with his Dad, and one subplot revolves around him rather callously pushing to sell off the family house and every bit of artwork Harold ever made.  And yet, in one of the film’s finest scenes, the implications of all this hit him in a rush, and the insecurities he still has coupled with his equally-real love for his father come rushing out.  Emma Thompson puts on a ceaselessly happy façade even as her husband lies in a coma, but every so often her deep despair seeps out without warning.  Danny has a terrible relationship with his father and brother, but has a wonderfully genuine connection with his daughter, Eliza.  Indeed, Eliza’s very existence seems to be a small ray of hope the film proffers to the viewer; a sign that, even in the midst of such pain and hurt and angst, a whole person can still emerge from all that; happy, healthy, and ready to take on the world. 

            You’ll note I haven’t said much yet about the daughter, Jean, even though Marvel gives a performance that matches in quality that of everyone else.  This is, unfortunately, because the film is never nearly as interested in exploring her character, past, and issues as it is those of her brothers, who are the focus of most of what happens over the course of the movie.  Even when she does get a chapter title of her own, late in the movie, it’s only so we can learn about an episode of sexual harassment she experienced as a teenager.  And even then, rather than take this opportunity to finally dive into her psyche, the moment merely ends up serving as another opportunity for her brothers to make it all about them and their issues. 

            I found this aspect of the movie especially disappointing given how amazingly well Baumbach has written complicated, struggling female characters in his earlier movies.  Given what I’d previously seen of his work, I would have assumed going into this movie that Jean’s story and development would have been the topper.  That this is not the case, or even that she does not seem to get even billing with her brothers, strikes me as an unfortunate self-inflicted wound that keeps what is a very, very good movie from being a truly great one. 

            But don’t let that deter anyone from seeing this- The Meyerowitz Stories IS a very, very good movie, one of the best family dramas of 2017, and absolutely worth seeing.  Just make sure you have a strong drink on hand before pressing the “start” button. 

-Noah Franc 

Films for the Trump Years: The Big Short

            Looking back at all that’s happened the past few decades, it seems a monumental task to try and sort out the most important turning points over the past 16 years that led us to the Trump era, but the Great Recession that bridged the Bush and Obama years is easily one of the biggest.  While 9/11 and the subsequent War on Terror was the genesis for the particular strains of xenophobia and fear now infecting us, the Great Recession birthed its evil twin; the collapse of trust for most Americans in the stability, competence, and trustworthiness of our institutions and basic norms of economics and governance.  

            Everything about it- the people who directly lost homes, savings, jobs, and more, the revelation of just how thoroughly corrupt the markets had become and how inadequate our systems of regulation were, the bailouts allowing those most guilty of the crash to walk away swimming in blood money, and beyond- stunk to high heaven.  Moreover, it produced twin ripple effects on both sides of the American political spectrum that we are still caught up in.  Before it was supercharged by the desire to destroy the first Black President, the Tea Party first came about as opposition within conservative ranks to the direct involvement of President Bush in saving the banks.  The results of the radicalization of the GOP from top to bottom this brought about are, unfortunately, obvious for all to see.   

            And although it has not yet reached the same level in terms of political power, liberals and progressives have been affected just as starkly.  The Occupy Wall Street movement changed forever much of the lexicon on the left in discussing economic inequality, and many in my generation became the first to abandon an instinctive opposition to anything branded with that dirty word “socialist,” willing to embrace ideas like those proposed by Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren that the Democratic Party would not have even contemplated addressing a decade ago.  And here, too, a strong tendency to inherently distrust and throw shade on anything deemed “establishment” is beginning to build to a destructive extreme. 

            Because of how important it is to bear in mind how the Recession is still not just affecting our economy, but even how we think about politics and society, in this month’s edition of Films for the Trump Years I suggest revisiting The Big Short, Adam McKay’s Oscar-winning masterpiece from 2015.  Based on the book by the same by Michael Lewis, one of today’s best non-fiction writers, it details how handful of finance expert with various backgrounds caught wind of the fact that the entire system propping up the housing and loans market was fraudulent.  With so many bad loans underwriting much of the American and global economy, it was not a question of if the system would crash, but when, and how badly. 

            What makes their stories so intriguing, complex, and interesting, is that none of these people are “good guys” in many senses of the word.  In their own way, they are just as greedy and opportunistic as those they are angry at for defrauding the public, because while they do try to raise at least a few alarm bells about what they find, they still don’t hesitate to profit off the crash when the opportunity arises. 

            What makes this movie a particular must-see, though, is how it uses its soundtrack, rapid-style editing, and fourth-wall breaks to not just tell a compelling story in a powerfully effective (which it does), but to also serve as a two-hour, Economics for Dummies Crash Course.  If you feel like you are hopelessly lost and unable to understand the many technical terms and ideas used in the industry, the movie reminds you that that is exactly the point- skullduggery like this is possible because its shrouded in such boring-sounding jargon, most people simply can’t muster the energy to pay much more than cursory attention to it all. 

            And therein lies the unfortunately all-too-cyclical nature of human greed and the systematic crashes it produces.  The movie pulls no punches at all in reminding the viewer just how cuttingly and awfully unfair it was that working people were ruined while the rich who made the crash were not punished in any meaningful way, and in revealing how a similar crash could easily just be a few more shorts away. 

            Like with most of the movies I select for this series, The Big Short is a film that calls for vigilance.  We can’t prevent every tragedy, but the more we resolve to work every day to open and re-open our eyes, and to educate ourselves about the world we live and the parts we play in whether we like it or no, the better our chances are of avoiding the next disaster. 

            So stay vigilant.  Stay woke.  And when you smell something, don’t ever hesitate to say something. 

-Noah Franc

Previously on Films for the Trump Years: 

Part 1- Selma

Part 2- Good Night, and Good Luck

Part 3- 13th 

Part 4- Get Out 

Part 5- Chasing Ice/Chasing Coral

The Top 11 Nostalgia Critic Episodes (Since His Return)

            It’s truly hard to believe, but this summer marked the 10^th anniversary of when Doug Walker began posting videos on Youtube under the moniker “Nostalgia Critic.”  It’s hard to grasp just how consequential and far-reaching the work of the Walker brothers and their current and former colleagues on TGWTG/Channel Awesome have been in pushing the bounds of online content and media criticism, and just how many remarkable careers have been given a boost as a result.  Doing so would require far more time and space than I currently have on this site, but it is a project well-worth undertaking one day, because no matter what form human online activity takes in the future, this remarkable past decade is worth remembering and celebrating. 

            For now, though, we will train out thoughts of appreciation to the man who was part of the very beginning, and who was, for many of us, the gateway to an entire online world that has become a continuous and essential part of our daily lives.  Doug Walker initially wanted to retire the Nostalgia Critic persona about 5 years ago so as to move on to other creative projects, but soon found that he (or, perhaps more accurately, his fanbase) just couldn’t quit the raving madman with a black cap, bad tie, and worse attitude he had created. 

            However, in a touch of sweet irony given the name of his character, attachment to the past has never held him down from trying out new ideas.  Since bringing back the character in 2013, he has continuously reinvented and altered the format of the show, throwing in more sketches, outside recurring characters, theme songs, and has most recently taken to effectively creating his own “parody” versions of recent theatrical releases, often while they’re still in theaters.  It certainly took some getting used to the new feel of everything at first, but since then he’s continued at full throttle and seems to have no regrets with coming back, and at this point there are actually more of the “new” NCs than there are of the old ones. 

            And so of course, there’s no better way to pause and say “thank you” than to- what else- honor this important anniversary with a Top 11 List of the Best Nostalgia Critic episodes since the big return (I’m deliberately excluding the old ones because I’ve already listed my favorites of those).  Also, for this list I’ve only focused on the regular movie/show NC reviews, not his shorter editorials from the off weeks, since they’re a different creature entirely and thus can’t really be compared the same way. 

            And with that said, here is my list of the Top 11 Nostalgia Critic episodes since his the return.  Why Top 11?  Because he’s always gone one step beyond for us, so we ought to do the same for him. 

Honorable Mentions: The Cat in the Hat, Foodfight, all the Nostalgic Commercial Specials, Bloodrayne, Mad Max: Fury Road, Top 11 Dumbest LOTR Moments, Top 11 WORST Avatar Episodes, Eight Crazy Nights, Dragon’s Lair, Turbo: A Power Rangers Movie

11. Mamma Mia (originally aired February 17, 2015)

            Doug Walker has often trained his critical sights on films and franchises that were meant to appeal to particularly narrow or problematic ideals of machismo and masculine identity (the Transformers franchise being a key recurring example).  His scathing critiques of the worst kinds of online internet “meninists” are undoubtedly some of his most important work, but with Mamma Mia, he flips his usual script and takes a similarly scathing look at the sorts of female-audience-seeking rom-coms that, in their own way, are just as backwards and repressive in their views of women as the works of Michael Bay or Zach Snyder are of men.

10. The Purge (originally aired July 29, 2014)

            Considered one of the worst missed opportunities for a horror movies of recent years, a Nostalgia Critic take on the film was always going to be good, but I’m sure no one could have predicted how good until the very end of the review, when a side gag about Pinky and the Brain breaking up concludes with the actual voice actors from the Animaniacs show appearing in Doug’s hotel room to record a profanity-filled fight between the two.  Forget being one of the best NCs of all time, this one should go down as a virtual cultural touchstone for everyone who grew up with the characters and perpetually wondered why the Brain really did keep putting up with his bumbling sidekick. 

9. A.I. Artificial Intelligence (May 28, 2013)

            This controversial Spielberg/Kubrick hybrid was right up in the wheelhouse of the Walker Brothers (Doug speaks repeatedly of his admiration for the work of Stanley Kubrick), meaning that an extra level of knowledge and passion was evident in every shot and joke.  That alone would have made this one for the record books, but the boys went the extra mile and used this NC as a vehicle for a vicious (and much-needed) takedown of TMZ specifically, and our collective culture of pulpy, superficial, scandal-driven media consumption in general.  Sadly, since the rise of a certain orange-colored Godzilla, this is one of those videos whose message has only gotten more potent and powerful with time. 

8. The 3^rd Animated Titanic Movie (originally aired September 26, 2016)

            The first two animated Titanic musicals are two of the most horrific things ever created by mankind.  Ergo, the NC videos on them rank as two of the funniest things the Walkers have ever produced.  Yet despite this, Doug insisted for years that the THIRD animated Titanic movie was one of the films he would never submit himself to.  Well, last year he finally broke down, and the results were every bit as amazing (and the movie every bit as atrocious) as we’d all hoped. 

7. Wicker Man (originally aired January 21, 2014)

            The themed reviews of January are always a special time for the NC, as regular and as important a fixture of the Channel Awesome site as Nostalgiaween and Doug Walker’s massive Christmas Boner, and Nicholas Cage Month, the first January after the return of the character, was no exception.  The Wicker Man video was not only the highlight of that month, but is particularly special for being the official introduction of Tamara into the Channel Awesome universe after Rachel’s departure the month before.    

6. Devil (October 29 2013), After Earth (June 30, 2014), The Happening (January 12, 2016), Lady in the Water (January 26, 2016)

            Oh Shyamalan.  Something about your awfulness as a filmmaker always manages to bring out the best and sharpest the Walker Brothers have to offer.  Because of how pointedly gleeful the NC takedowns of this man’s travesties masquerading as films are, I couldn’t bring myself to try and judge these separately; otherwise half this list would be taken up by Shyamalan films (they’ve also done an equally excellent NC for Signs, but that was before the retirement, so I’m not listing it here).  They are all works of comedic art, as brilliant as the films themselves aren’t, and deserved to be appreciated together. 

5. Les Miserables (originally aired August 20, 2013)

            Back in the very young days of this blog, which I coincidentally started right when Doug Walker tried retiring the Nostalgia Critic, I ranked the massive crossover review of Moulin Rouge as the best Nostalgia Critic review for its sheer size and scope.  Since the return, he has done an increasing number of really big reviews in the same vein, with larger effects, songs, and bigger and bigger stars, including ones tackling other big musical releases.  While some (Phantom of the Opera) didn’t quite reach the same heights as the Moulin Rouge one did, the review of the recent Les Miserables remake absolutely did, creating a comedic critic experience every bit as sublime as his first foray into this genre. 

4. The Last Airbender (originally aired September 3, 2013)

            Yes, this is also a Shyamalan movie, but there is a very specific reason I’m putting it ahead of the others listed above.  You see, there was once a time, way back in the early days of TGWTG, where Doug would list the upcoming reviews he planned to do a month or so in advance.  It didn’t take long, of course, for negative reactions to preemptively start filtering in beforehand, in the vein of, “How DARE he lay his hands on THIS classic??”  Soon, he abandoned the practice entirely, which meant that, in most cases, there would rarely be any clue what movie he was doing next more than a week or two in advance. 

            The Last Airbender was a rare exception to this- soon after the return, Doug announced that he fully intended to give the film the full NC treatment, but as he’d never seen any of the original show before, he announced almost a year in advance that he would first watch every episode of the original series and document his thoughts, the first time he’d ever done something like that.  This allowed our anticipation of the eventual film review, which was never going to be anything less than amazing, to build and marinate in a way that it never has for any other NC.  The payoff of finally seeing it when it came brought the sort of satisfaction few other things can. 

            Plus, his videos on the TV show (which he now lauds as his new favorite show of all time) directly led to the ongoing Vlog series he now does with Rob, which have expanded beyond The Last Airbender to include Legend of Korra, Adventure Time, Gravity Falls, Steven Universe, and more, which are, in my book, every bit as excellent as any of the other material on the site. 

3. The Lorax (originally aired May 6, 2014)

            Dr. Seuss, much like Stanley Kubrick, has always been one of the artists Doug Walker professes a particular devotion to.  Naturally, this has made the recent slew of live-action “adaptations” of his classic books all the more painful for him to watch, and thus, all the funnier for us to experience.  With the Lorax review, though, he went the extra mile to deconstruct just how culturally harmful this particularly noxious form of modern capitalism is.  Not only are these movies and the marketing around them horribly at odds with the spirit of the original works, they represent a modern trend that simply seeks to consume all there is of a fad until nothing is left.  In addition to ripping into an awful film, Doug took extra care with this video to remind us how such seemingly “harmless” movies contribute to a culture where we allow ourselves and the world around to become an emptier, unhappier place, rather than a better one. 

2. Man of Steel (originally aired November 26, 2013)

            And speaking of Man of Steel, Nostalgia Critic was clearly hitting a sweet spot in late 2013, as he followed up his huge reviews of Les Miserables and The Last Airbender with another of his all-time greats, a crossover with Angry Joe looking at what, at the time, was the most bitterly divisive of the superhero movie franchises being created.  The review is every bit as big and bombastic as the film itself, featuring a return of Doug’s Donner-era Zod impersonation, and a crossover with the Superhero Café squad from How It Should Have Ended. 

            And the #1 Nostalgia Critic video since his return is…..

1. Top 11 Best Avatar Episodes (September 23, 2014) 

            There was a lot going for this episode from the outset.  It’s Avatar themed, always a winning choice.  It’s a Top 11, and those have always been some of the best and most interesting works by the Walkers.  What sets this one apart as both the best Top 11 they’ve ever done AND the best video they’ve done period since bringing back the character is the presence of Dante Basco as possibly the best guest appearance ever within the NC universe, appearing as a live-action version of Zuko obsessed with destroying the Nostalgia Critic for daring to critique his show.  Add in some of the greatest fourth wall humor ever written, and you have something truly special, something destined to last as long as the show will. 

            And that concludes our very, very brief look at the Nostalgia Critic’s work since returning from the beyond all those years ago.  It has been a remarkable journey with him and his cohorts, and I sincerely hope we have years more to look forward to.  Thank you, Doug and Rob, for everything. 

-Noah Franc `