TAMMY

In which Melissa McCarthy (BRIDESMAIDS) plays a woman who has lost her job and her husband, and goes on an impromptu road trip with her similarly unboundaried alcoholic grandmother (Susan Sarandon.) We are meant to be amused by their scampy hi-jinks as they wend their way to Niagara Falls, picking up guys en route (Mark Duplass) robbing a fast food joint and generally being mildly transgressive. The problem is that all of this is way too underwritten - way too unfunny - and it seems that as fine an actress as Susan Sarandon is, she’s not even attempting to truly play an old woman. Contrast this performance with Julie Walters, also aged up to play a granny going on an impromptu road-trip in THE HARRY HILL MOVIE. The only scene worth anything is when Tammy and her grandmother end up at a magnificent house owned by two gay lovers played by Kathy Bates and Sandra Oh. Tammy is feeling sorry for herself but Bates’ character schools her on how hard she had to work for everything she has, as well as acceptance. It’s the only moving and authentic moment in the whole film. Otherwise, TAMMY follows the typical comedy arc with the protagonist falling out with people and then making up, finding self-knowledge en route. I just wish that Melissa McCarthy and the Hollywood producers who throw scripts her way would realise that she is a better actress than this, and just because she played a gross character on BRIDESMAIDS doesn’t mean that she has to play versions of that for the rest of her career. She’s a beautiful woman. How about being daring and giving her a conventional rom-com?  The fact that she CHOSE to co-write this movie makes me all the more sad.

TAMMY has a running time of 97 minutes and is rated R.  The movie is on release in the USA, Canada, Germany, Singapore, the UK and Ireland. It goes on release in Kuwait on July 28th, Denmark on July 31st, South Africa on August 29th and Australia on October 16th.

ENOUGH SAID - LFF 2013 - Late Review

Nicole Holofcener is an American writer-director who specialises in brutally honest, sometimes brutally unpleasant films about women of a certain income in California. I had some issues with her last film, PLEASE GIVE, which could be described with the hashtag onepercentproblems, and if I, greedy capitalist bastard that I am, found it self-involved, imagine what everyone else must have thought.

The good news is that her latest film, ENOUGH SAID, is far more heart-warming while sacrificing none of her authentic observations of women-of-a-certain-age.  Perhaps that has something to do with casting James Gandolfini and Julia Louis-Dreyfus - two of the most charming and likeable actors.  Or perhaps it just has something to do with accepting a more conventional high-concept rom-com conceit.

The movie focusses on Eva (Louis-Dreyfus), a middle-aged masseuse whose beloved daughter Ellen is about to leave for college.  She starts dating schlubby Albert (Gandolfini) but sabotages the relationship when she realises that one of her clients is his ex-wife Marianne (Catherine Keener). Rather than dump the client or confess to Albert, Eva just can't help but ask the ex what went wrong, and Marianne's jaundiced view of Albert becomes contagious.

To be honest, the chamber comedy aspect of this film - Eva hiding behind a bush to avoid meeting Marianne and Albert's daughter - the final reveal that she knew all along - is  the least satisfying part of the movie.  What really holds our attention is the finely observed and heart-warming depiction of the insecurities of middle-aged dating and the way in which parents fear their children leaving home. In fact, there were times at which I wished the side plot had more room to breathe - the way in which Eva subsconsiously fills her time with her daughter's lonely best friend was so tragic and real it broke my heart.

So what are we left with? Nicole Holofcener's most approachable film, full of human truth, if saddled with a rather clumsy conceit. Gandolfini and Louis-Dreyfus are a pleasure to spend time with, and it's so sad that this is Jim's last film. 

ENOUGH SAID has a running time of 91 minutes and is rated PG-13 in the USA. 

ENOUGH SAID played Toronto and London 2013 and was released earlier this year in the USA, Canada, the UK, Ireland, Turkey, Mexico, Israel and Singapore. It is currently on release in Australia. It opens on November 29th in Poland, on December 5th in Greece, Hungary, Brazil and Lithuania, on December 19th in Germany and Spain, on January 15th in France and the Netherlands and in Italy on April 10th.