Men, Women & Children (2014)

5/5

Jason Reitman's latest film is an utterly absorbing, thought-provoking film. It is a movie about kids growing up and couples growing apart, about technology and communication, and about interaction and isolation. An ensemble drama, it follows several threads: a husband (Sandler) and wife (DeWitt) who start cheating on each other, a mother (Garner) who safeguards her daughter (Dever) from the dangers of the Internet, another mother (Greer) who seems to do the opposite, and a high schooler (Elgort) who gives up football for online gaming.

The topic of technology leading to isolation has been done before (the aptly-titled Disconnect tackles the issue exceptionally well). But Men, Women & Children is not about technology. It is about coming of age in modern society. And it teaches us all about that in devastating, funny, touching ways. The title tells you the focus of the film; it is about the individuals that make up society, not the technology. Each story feels heartfelt and true, rich with subtext and hidden meaning. The performances are subtle, with big names playing small roles. Despite restrained acting, the movie does occasionally veer into melodrama. But on the whole, it reflects life accurately in both tone and color.

People will talk about this movie for its depiction of technology, because everything is replicated with precision. The UI is spot-on, whether we're looking at Facebook on a computer or a text message on an iPhone. Even the sounds of notifications ring true to our 21st century ear. But Reitman takes it one step further. The way he shows technology is itself a comment on technology. Screens pop up and overlay the action with every bowed head. They may sit in the background, but they never go away. As audience members, we find our eyes drawn to the neighbors' Twitter feed instead of the protagonists' actions. Is this how we live now, looking down everytime we feel a buzz when something else is going on right in front of our very eyes?

The big problem with being so pixel-perfect is that it securely sets Men, Women & Children in this time and place. User interfaces and interaction metaphors change at an ultrafast pace, which may date this movie just 6 months from now. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but I think I'll have a very different perspective watching this movie 20 years from now. Not just because the change in technology will make this movie look and feel old, but because life will have happened to me. I will start to recognize the nuance in characters' motivations; I will be hit harder by the mistakes they make and touched more profoundly by the affection they show. And that's what this movie gets so right. That's why I can't wait to watch this movie again: 20 years from now and hopefully many times in between.

IMDb link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3179568/

The Odd Life of Timothy Green (2012)

3/5

The Odd Life of Timothy Green is a fairly benign family film. The plot follows Cindy (Garner) and Tim Green (Edgerton), a young infertile couple. The movie starts after another unsuccessful attempt at pregnancy. Distraught, they drive home barely talking to each other. To cheer themselves up, they allow themselves to dream up the perfect child. They write down the six characteristics they would see in their child, put the papers in a box, and bury the box in the yard. Magically, a ten-year-old boy named Timothy (Adams) sprouts out of the ground and into their lives.

All the technical aspects of the film, from acting to shooting to editing, are satisfactory enough not to stand out. The movie is honestly quite silly. But the plot is merely a device to allow the characters to learn about life, love, and parenting. Despite that, there are so many extraneous scenes to explain the plot instead of digging in to meatier thematics. It actually held a lot of potential with its simple metaphor, but the director chose to go for trite tropes rather than intellectually-stimulating concepts. Still, it's a saccharine story with attractive actors and colorful cinematography and is perfectly fine for afternoon filmgoing. It just isn't as good as it could be.

IMDb link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1462769/