More guff from director/co-writer Noah Baumbach. (Emily Mortimer was the other co-writer and has a minor role as a vacuous something-or-other.) His first project since White Noise (2022) and/or Barbie (2023), depending on what you count.
The cast is amazing. George Clooney led with an orange-man tan, making me wonder if it is now a requirement for U.S. presidential candidates. I was hoping for more from Adam Sandler: there's a feeling that he's barely getting out of second gear for most of it. He has some great scenes with Laura Dern (solid), impassive while her head, hair and hands go in all directions and her face takes on all expressions. I would have far preferred to see their Eiffel Tower story. This proves that there is material that even Jim Broadbent cannot elevate. Billy Crudup! Alba Rohrwacher (La Chimera (2023))! Stacy Keach, never sharkier, as Clooney's dad! And of course Greta Gerwig.
The story itself is the purest Hollywood navel gazing. Clooney knows just how much self awareness he can get away with, most days, but age and daughters have caught up to him. His performance was something of a complement to Bill Shatner's Has Been (2004) persona, or perhaps just minor variations on himself. The concluding homage reminded me of the similarly-flawed The Fabelmans (2022) and Hugo (2011).
The cinematography is effective but uninventive. The story is a pile of cliches made even more tedious by repeated tics: the cheesecake, "Can we go again?", the loneliness, Baumbach telling us something then showing how it went down. This telegraphing is indistinguishable from padding. It would've helped if it was in any way funny, like those long-gone Coen brothers flicks. Overlong.
Peter Sobczynski: shallow. If only it went all-in on Sandler's character. Dana Stevens: lifts from Fellini, "pays tribute to François Truffaut and Preston Sturges."
