IT'S ALL ABOUT LOVING YOUR FAMILY
Alexander Payne's The Descendants reinforces my suspicion that Hollywood is going all mushy on us with two-hour-long family tearjerkers featuring good-looking stars and gorgeous locations gratuitously passed off as grand entertainment. Barring George Clooney's fighting effort to salvage his character from the slush, this film is actually a not-so-cleverly camouflaged sack of cliches played out in picture-postcard Hawaii.
Clooney's Matt King has a mid-life crisis of Shakespearean proportions, or so we must imagine. In his opening monologue he alludes to his own weaknesses of character. But his problems are far greater than his indiscretions -- we'll never find out how bad those were, because they don't figure in Payne's worldview. He's just a confused, clumsy, handsome lawyer who also happens to have family land worth millions and millions of dollars which he must concur with his cousins to sell.
And a wife in coma.
But wait, it gets worse. His two obnoxious daughters (who should have been slapped into shape long ago) are driving him up the wall. He doesn't know how to tackle them, because well, basically he's not been around much -- "I'm a back-up father," he confesses. The last log falls on his head when he finds out from his older child Alex (young Shailene Woodley who's absolutely stunning) that his wife was in fact cheating on him with a really slimy-type real estate agent.
Masochist to the core, Matt now decides to go off in search of the said agent to allow him a final glimpse of his dying lover. Isn't that just the kind of thing Sanjay Leela Bhansali would make his heroes do? Along the way, his distressed family gets to de-stress on the beach in the company of Alex's offensive friend Sid (Nic Krause) -- whose sick humour Americans must find amusing, because he's becoming quite a stereotype in their comedies.
Matt is a basket of nerves and confusion and Clooney wears both with the casual ease of those lovely printed Hawaiian shirts. He's self-effacing too -- as stated above, the writers throw all their weight behind his cause, glossing over his shortcomings and focussing on his role as martyr. And occasionally wise -- "You give your children enough money to do something, but not enough to do nothing," explaining his 'stingy' lifestyle, which doesn't seem to have done much for his kids, but never mind that.
This is supposed to be one of those 'you laugh at them and you cry with them' kind of films where you feel for the characters and smile at the clever dialogue while imbibing profound life lessons. Sadly, The Descendants didn't do that for me, although for the pleasure of watching Clooney alone, and for his wonderfully giving performance, I didn't mind suffering it at all.
Ha ha! That's my Clooney bias DG. He looks good in anything. And some of those prints are really pretty, when not in loud colours.
Posted by: Deepa Deosthalee | Jan 26, 2012 at 07:20
Beg to differ about the Hawaiian shirts... they don't suit anybody! And certainly not men above 19.
Posted by: Deepa Gahlot | Jan 25, 2012 at 23:29