Criterion Sunday 552: Broadcast News (1987)

This news satire, in which Holly Hunter’s TV news producer Jane opens the film arguing desperately against the erosion of news journalistic standards in chasing entertainment value and glossy smarmy hosts, already tells a story that is nostalgic, depicting a lost era when there still seemed to be some possibility to tell true stories of the world. That said, in pegging this change to Jane’s lovelife — the way she is pulled between two men, the earnest, intelligent yet abrasive journalist Aaron (played by Albert Brooks) and the unctuous, slightly vapid yet still sincere Tom (William Hurt) — is extremely likeable. As you’d expect from a veteran of television like writer/director James L. Brooks, this is both pretty incisive stuff that understands its milieu well, but also written with an eye to the funny. From an era when a lot of the most lauded films are pretty unwatchable now (and certainly Joan Cusack’s fashion choices here haven’t aged brilliantly), this makes a case for being one of the decade’s best and most watchable films and even if it’s still a product of its times, there’s a real glow from watching Holly Hunter being competent and professional.

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FILM REVIEW: Criterion Collection
Director/Writer James L. Brooks; Cinematographer Michael Ballhaus; Starring Holly Hunter, William Hurt, Albert Brooks, Joan Cusack; Length 132 minutes.

Seen at home (DVD), Wellington, Sunday 10 July 2022.

Two Relationship Dramas by Nicole Holofcener: Friends with Money (2006) and The Land of Steady Habits (2018)

There’s a certain strand of filmmaking that I like to think of as ‘low stakes cinema’ where nothing really bad happens or is likely to happen to any of the characters — no one’s actions are going to kill or seriously hurt anyone, and there might be a bit of embarrassment or hurt feelings, or even a relationship break-up at the very worst. Much of Nicole Holofcener’s cinema sort of fits neatly in there, and the lives she depicts are just a little more ragged around the edges than, say, Nancy Meyers’s (certainly their homes are less punishingly set designed). Both of these films deal with ensemble casts, groups of people defined by relationships, whether romantic or those of friendship, navigating through complications, without the kind of pat resolution you get with, say, sitcoms. In this way they fit somewhat into the same mould that younger ‘mumblecore’ filmmakers were doing at the same time, though her filmmaking seems closer to the kind of comfortable New York background of Noah Baumbach, something which traces its lineage back through Woody Allen. Between these two films below she made Please Give (2010, which I’ve seen and liked, though wasn’t able to rouse myself to write much about it) and Enough Said (2013), which is just lovely, and I think one of the last screen performances from James Gandolfini.

Welcome to Me (2014)

Stories about characters with mental health issues crop up every so often, and I need to make it clear from the outset that I’m not one to judge how competent these films are with respect to the issues they raise. If for example Silver Linings Playbook seemed a bit cavalier with its characters — it seemed to me to have a propensity to treat them as adorably and irretrievably kooky — there are other voices who nevertheless adored it. I wouldn’t say quite the same about Welcome to Me (it seems less willing to laugh at its protagonist), but it does advance Kristen Wiig’s unlikely claim to be one of the most versatile actors currently working, or certainly one who’ll happily attach herself to outwardly uncommercial prospects (Kristens seem to make bold and unconventional choices, as her namesake Stewart is another I’d pick out in this category). Wiig plays Alice, a woman with a personality disorder who wins big on the lottery and uses it to realise her dream of a reality show on a local cable access network run by brothers Rich and Gabe (respectively James Marsden and Wes Bentley). Her flights of fancy become increasingly trying on the producers — one of whom is played by Joan Cusack, and indeed this is a film with many pleasing small roles for excellent actors — and on the brothers, but she garners a bit of cult success. Welcome to Me itself seems destined for cult status, and if it’s not always perfect, it does find a very interesting, blackly comedic tone in its awkward and stilted exchanges. Kristen Wiig is of course the glue that holds the whole thing together, and she shows great adeptness at the comedy, though this is perhaps unsurprising, given the overall sense that this film is like an extended final skit on Saturday Night Live (always the slot where the greatest weirdness is allowed to flourish).

CREDITS
Director Shira Piven; Writer Elliot Laurence; Cinematographer Eric Alan Edwards; Starring Kristen Wiig, Linda Cardellini, Wes Bentley, James Marsden, Joan Cusack; Length 87 minutes.
Seen at Curzon Bloomsbury, London, Wednesday 30 March 2016.