Category: Movie Reviews

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Movie Review: Beau Is Afraid Is Too Difficult Yet Too Simple

Few American directors have made a movie as important as Hereditary (2018), so Ari Aster deserves our attention with each new output. But his newest release, Beau Is Afraid, falls well short of his best. In fact, given his also-disappointing intervening film, Midsommar (2019), I’m beginning to wonder whether he can ever reassume the heights of his debut.

Execution has never been a problem for Aster. Scene after scene in Beau Is Afraid is well shot and well acted, and many bits are quite funny. The problem is concept. Like Midsommar, the new film falls flat because it dabbles in surrealism without offering the benefits of surrealism. It presents metaphorical, narratively challenging content—but its underlying ideas lack complexity and therefore don’t warrant the challenging style. In other words, Aster, for the second straight time, has provided the worst of both worlds: a film that’s at once too narratively abstract and too thematically simplistic.

The first section of the film, the strongest by far, hints at a contemporary Eraserhead (1977), a paranoid urban nightmare for the 2020s. But even here, there’s a lack of visual verve that suggests that Aster isn’t totally committed to nightmarishness—that, unlike David Lynch, he’s a tourist in the dreamscape. And indeed, after the first act, the absurdist elements gradually fade away. The source of Aster’s inconsistency soon becomes evident: he doesn’t care about the nightmare; he cares about where it came from. He has de-prioritized filmmaking, prioritized psychologizing. An unacceptable flaw that pervades the entire film.

Recall that Aster at his best has captured scenes like Toni Collette’s dinner table eruption in Hereditary. In that film, the family strife felt primitive and scary: it felt real. The latter half of Beau Is Afraid, on the other hand, feels like a bad play, with characters airing grievances in icy, contemptuous monologues. This is weak stuff. The movie’s finale, in which Beau (Joaquin Phoenix) literally goes on trial for being a bad Jewish son, is the inevitable letdown the film has been racing toward. Aster, having started at Lynch, has ended at Woody Allen. Not a favorable trajectory.

I worry that Aster may have attained artistic and financial freedom too quickly, thanks to the success of Hereditary. Stanley Kubrick had to labor through Spartacus (1960) and Lolita (1962) to learn how to package his ideas into studio-financed films. Lynch had to suffer through Dune (1984). These were formative experiences not only because they offered lessons in industry tact, but also because they forced their respective directors to overcome resistance, to learn to squeeze more artistry into less space. Weightlifters have to train with heavy weights.

Aster, treated like a prodigy from the moment of his debut, may be atrophying.

 

–Jim Andersen

@jimander91

For more on Ari Aster, see my full analysis of Hereditary.

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Triangle of Sadness Throws Power Dynamics Overboard

Triangle of Sadness, directed by Ruben Ostlund, serves up plentiful food for thought. Told in three sections (a triangle indeed), the film follows a young couple, both models, who first argue about monetary responsibilities, then join a group of wealthy vacationers on a cruise, then finally wind up marooned on an island. Together, these episodes form an intriguing examination of the slippery nature of power dynamics.

Ostlund’s message is best understood by following the trajectory of male model Carl (Harris Dickerson), the movie’s central character. At a casting call early in the film, a photographer tests Carl’s versatility by prompting him to alternate between smiling and frowning. The smiles, as the photographer reminds him, accord with ads for cheaper brands like H&M. The frowns, meanwhile, correspond with designer brands like Balenciaga. The reasoning: the rich look down on the poor, so a model for luxury brands should emote condescension and even annoyance toward regular people viewing the ads.

Perhaps worried by this uncomfortable message, Carl soon confronts his girlfriend Yaya (Charlbi Dean) about having to pay for meals at restaurants. Yaya makes more money than he does, so Carl feels that she should at least split some of the bills. But Yaya rebuts him, initially citing his responsibility as a man to provide for her—but later admitting that she merely plans to become someone else’s trophy wife and has no emotional investment in the relationship. The photographer was right: Yaya, the wealthier and more influential of the two, looks down on Carl. It isn’t about fairness, as Carl advocates for. Rather, it’s about power: since Yaya is more influential, she can use him as a ploy for Instagram clout and dump him when the time is right. She can even openly admit to this without fearing a breakup.

Carl insists that he’ll make Yaya change her mind and fall in love with him. But on a luxury cruise, things don’t change. Carl becomes jealous when a shirtless crewmember greets Yaya, and, pathetically, he whines about it to the staff and gets the man fired. It’s clearer than ever that Yaya holds all the cards in this relationship. In our society, after all, female beauty comes valued more highly than male beauty. Yaya’s social media following—much larger than Carl’s—has allowed the couple to board the cruise in the first place.

Variations and commentaries on the couple’s power dynamic abound on the cruise. The rich guests boss around the crew and staff. Two characters drunkenly argue about capitalism and communism. Amidst all of this, the ship symbolically begins to tilt in stormy seas: the power dynamics may be shifting. And such a shift would cause quite a shock, as evidenced by the memorable bodily reactions experienced by the pompous vacationers.

In the last section of the movie, this shift has occurred. Shipwrecked by a pirate’s grenade, the survivors, including Carl and Yaya, establish an island community. But wealth no longer holds sway in the new hierarchy. Instead, toilet manager Abigail (Dolly de Leon) takes command, as only she knows how to survive in the wild. And one of Abigail’s first orders of business is to request sexual favors from Carl in exchange for special treatment. He readily complies.

On the island, it seems, things have reversed: male beauty now has greater worth. Yaya tries to inflame Carl’s old jealousy to win him back, but her efforts are futile. Without her former influence, the old power dynamic between the two doesn’t apply.

Carl’s position on the island, though, is awfully similar to his old position. He has merely swung from being used by Yaya to being used by Abigail. Both women hold great power in different types of societies for different reasons. And Carl gains special treatment from each by supplying something that each of them needs: Instagram aesthetics for Yaya, sexual favors for Abigail.

So the movie ends with Carl running through the jungle to rescue…whom? Yaya? Abigail? Does it matter?

Ostlund won’t show us the rest of the scene because it doesn’t. Carl is no romantic, as he claims to be in the first section. Rather, he’s like everyone else: someone who exchanges what he has to get what he can. His supposed principles go overboard on stormy seas, leaving only a weak, common person, smiling up at the powerful—who frown in condescension back at him.

 

–Jim Andersen

For more movie reviews, see my review on The Banshees of Inisherin

 

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The Banshees of Inisherin Insists on Dark Realities

The Banshees of Inisherin, directed by Martin McDonagh, is an odd movie about a friendship that suddenly fractures. Its oddness serves it well. While not a perfect or even a great film, Banshees has artistic purpose that leaves certain images lingering in the mind long afterward. For that reason alone, the film is worth watching.

The film’s literal narrative follows the consequences of the decision by a musician named Colm (Brendan Gleeson) to suddenly break off his longtime friendship with neighbor Padraic (Colin Farrell). Colm explains that, feeling his advancing age, he no longer wants to spend his days mulling trivial matters with Padraic. He wants to focus on grand matters like music and philosophy, which fall outside Padraig’s understanding.

Like Padraic, we refuse to accept this reasoning. What, after all, is grander than friendship? But Colm has made up his mind, and he’ll do whatever it takes to convince his former friend that a reversal isn’t in the cards. Not much happens in this movie, but suffice to say that Colm’s intransigence combined with Padraic’s desperate incomprehension initiates a downward spiral for both characters. Without each other to reign in their excesses—Colm’s lofty intellectualism and Padraic’s emotional quaintness—each descends into an equal and opposite type of madness.

Some have said that the story is mostly compelling for its allegorical value. It recreates the wariness and heartbreak of the Irish Civil War, and references the conflict multiple times to reinforce the link. But I don’t know much about the Irish Civil War, and chances are that you don’t, either; so I don’t think this is particularly relevant to the experience of watching the movie, unless you’re very interested in Irish history.

I’m pretty much out of things to say about this highly acclaimed film. And I suspect that McDonagh wanted it this way: The Banshees of Inisherin simply doesn’t lend itself to analysis or discussion. Rather, its power lies in its reminder that, as the loquacious Padraic eventually comes to understand, some problems are unsolvable—that words don’t always help or even illuminate. That’s a bitter pill to swallow for Padraic, and it’s perhaps even more bitter for us viewers. But it forces us to take the film seriously, and it forces us to confront dark realities that we’d otherwise prefer to ignore.

 

–Jim Andersen

For more reviews of 2023 Oscar nominees, see my review of Women Talking.

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Elvis Has Become a Character, Not a Person

Last year, in my review of King Richard, I described my disinterest in what I called the “Celebration movie” genre. These films function essentially as positive press for stars or celebrities—and by inevitable necessity play loose with the facts. As I wrote then:

I question the value of a “biography” made with its own subjects’ approval in mind, other than as fan service; the usual purpose of a biography is to illuminate truths that the subjects may not want to come to light, in order to supplement, round out, or even contradict the popular image. Since King Richard is not interested in doing any of this, there’s little reason to see it.

A similar dynamic is at play in the new biopic, Elvis, directed by Baz Luhrmann and starring Austin Butler. But it’s not quite the same. Because unlike the Williams tennis family, Elvis Presley has already been the subject of many movies, and he’ll surely be the subject of many more to come. He’s also long dead, which means that neither he nor his estate stands to gain much financially from the venture.

The ones who do stand to gain from a movie like Elvis are the viewers who cherish Elvis Presley as a preeminent American hero. Because while Elvis may not need press, he does need, as James Bond does every so often, a reinvention—a reboot of his character that will allow him to fit back into the national psyche. After all, since his last movie appearance, Elvis has accumulated some skeptics and haters: many wonder, for instance, whether he was an artistic freeloader, hijacking Black musical aesthetics for his own fame and fortune.

Never fear, though. Because just as Bond maneuvered to avert nuclear war in the 1960’s but last year endeavored to fight bioterrorism, Elvis Presley in this new film stands against…the scourge of racism.

Must we really do this? Must we break down historical figures and reassemble them into 2020’s-approved versions of themselves? In addition to being inaccurate, it prevents any nuanced discussion or commentary about the issues at hand. For example, in the movie, Elvis yearns to fight injustice, as if he could enlist against it like a soldier. But racism isn’t some cabal that one can try to take down; it’s something pervasive that culturally affects everyone. Framing the story in this way ensures that we learn nothing about Elvis and nothing about racism.

In addition to Elvis’s new role as a would-be Civil Rights hero, the other focus of the movie is Elvis’s financial exploitation at the hands of greedy capitalists (represented by an unwatchably campy Tom Hanks). This theme, also, just happens to be 2020’s-approved—informing, for example, recent national stories like Brittany Spears’ proprietorship and NCAA athlete compensation.

Maybe once the polar ice caps melt a little more, we’ll get a biopic about how Elvis fought the evils of climate change.

In summary, the only purpose of this movie is to rehabilitate Elvis Presley—to assuage our collective anxiety that he hasn’t deserved our worship over the decades. But such movies don’t ring true, even as propaganda. Because Elvis is not James Bond. He’s a real person with a legacy like any real person’s: complicated and context-dependent. Maybe in his next reboot, he’ll come closer to feeling like one.

 

–Jim Andersen

For more reviews, check out my review of Women Talking.

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Women Talking Shows Morality’s Aesthetic Limits

There’s certainly no more aptly named film this year than Women Talking, directed by Sarah Polloy. Indeed, this film consists of women talking. If you want to hear them out, go see the film. If you want the dramatic elements that typically appeal to moviegoers, though, you may struggle to enjoy it.

Morality and aesthetics don’t always go hand in hand, and Women Talking provides an example of the two very much at odds. For instance, Polloy leaves entirely off the screen the character Klaus, the principal aggressor who has brutalized the women of a religious community. Such a directing choice is morally laudable: why should he get air time, given his actions? Wouldn’t that partly glamorize his behavior?

But aesthetically, the decision is unconscionable. Klaus may be monstrous, but he has set the entire story in motion. Eliminating him leaves us with no drama, no narrative power. Imagine if Shakespeare had decided that Iago didn’t deserve to be portrayed onstage—who would want to see Othello? What great story could withstand the removal of its primary antagonist?

I’m reminded of the recent Netflix series, Dahmer. According to its director and producers, the artistic aim of the show was to “decentralize” notorious serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer—to put his victims at the center of the narrative, where they supposedly belonged. But the sad truth about Dahmer’s crimes is that dramatically, his victims aren’t at the center of the story. Heinous and pathetic though he is, Dahmer links his victims together. They hold no importance for us other than that they crossed paths with him. That makes him, unfortunately, the main character.

So Netflix’s effort was doomed from the start: victims’ families complained that, contrary to the ostensible goal, Dahmer had been glamorized. And they were right. Because the moment Dahmer appears, he inevitably attracts all the attention.

Women Talking seeks to rectify this problem by truly decentralizing its aggressor: by taking him out of the story entirely. But the experiment shatters the test tubes, because without him, there’s barely any story at all. Moral, yes; interesting, no. Such is the dilemma of the socially conscious artist.

There are other issues with this movie. The most impactful is that the women have been written as recognizable “types,” which makes them too one-note to believe in. The Fighter. The Sweetheart. The Troublemaker. The Matriarch. As a byproduct of this, the most likeable character in the film is…the only man in the movie, since he’s the only one who gets to have the kind of diverse and conflicting qualities that real people have. This disappointing backfire, in fact, often plagues movies about women having their own space. (See: A League of Their Own.) Having more characters of one gender can actually reduce the complexity of those characters, because it can leave each one with too few qualities to feel real.

As you can tell, I didn’t much enjoy Women Talking. But I’ll give it this: it’s unique. It represents the limit, in some ways, of morality-centric storytelling, the demand for which has obviously increased in the past few years. Maybe this kind of storytelling will become a dominant aesthetic going forward. But I doubt it. After all, few have seen Women Talking. Whereas, for example, Dahmer—that exploitative and immoral sleaze-fest—was the second-highest viewed Netflix series of all time.

 

–Jim Andersen

For more reviews, see my review of All Quiet on the Western Front

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All Quiet on the Western Front Strains For Shock Value

Every year, it seems, we must have a film that reminds us that War Is Bad. The Netflix production All Quiet on the Western Front fulfills the function this year, so if you enjoy films with that message—surely you already know whether you do or don’t—then it may be for you.

But I can’t help but wonder: is the movie really necessary? Back in 2020, I wrote in a positive review of the war film 1917:

Like Dunkirk (2017) before it, 1917 uses the newest technology to spike maximum adrenaline. But how long before even newer technology spikes even more adrenaline? In this genre, the next big effort is never far behind.

If anything, my prediction now seems too optimistic. I had anticipated “more adrenaline,” but All Quiet on the Western Front, a film with nearly the exact same subject matter as 1917 (and with a protagonist who even looks strangely similar) only provides more gruesomeness. Disembodied limbs, young men crying, kids killing people: this movie has it all. Because apparently, it’s now passé to say that War Is Bad. One must say that War Is Really Bad.

Therein lies the problem with making movies of unoriginal concepts. The only way to justify their existences is to startle viewers with even more of what the precursors already provided. Okay, Saving Private Ryan, I call your soldier carrying his own blown-off arm, and I raise you…a trench full of soldiers being flamethrower-ed alive! And a crippled guy killing himself with a kitchen fork!

The implication, even if unintentional, is that the precursors were too timid—that this, finally, is the real deal.

But is it? None of us were there, so we don’t know. It’s awfully suspicious, though, that all of these World War I movies happen to be coming out at around the time when none of the war’s survivors could possibly be alive anymore to debunk any inaccuracies. Surely no one doubts the horror of war, but is it sacrilege to wonder whether, artistically, we’ve lost the plot?

You get my point. Before I finish, though, I do want to admire the one interesting aspect of this film: its original score, composed by Volker Bertelmann. Blaring but sporadic, ominous but not evil-sounding, it gives us a taste of what this movie could have been with a different approach. It’s too bad that among the contributors to All Quiet on the Western Front, only Bertelmann actualized a wartime vision that was grounded, stylish, and, most importantly, unconventional.

 

–Jim Andersen

For more reviews, see my review of Marcel the Shell with Shoes On.

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Marcel the Shell Can Support a Whole Movie

I knew in advance about the universal acclaim piled on the feature-length Marcel the Shell with Shoes On, but the delightfulness of the movie still caught me off guard. I suppose in retrospect that the concept struck me as a cash grab. I thought: a bunch of silly YouTube shorts extended into a full movie? Please. Going viral is one thing; sustaining attention over 90 minutes is another.

Except…maybe it isn’t. After all, there’s no reason why a great character shouldn’t grab us, no matter what the media format. Remember that unlike other smash hits of the early YouTube era, the original “Marcel the Shell” shorts didn’t rely on zany or stupid behavior, and they weren’t real-world goofs a la “America’s Funniest Home Videos.” Instead, they functioned essentially as old fashioned dramatic monologues.

So then, skeptics of a Marcel-based feature film, I ask you: why not?

Watching Marcel the Shell (Jenny Slate) doesn’t get tiresome. His vacillations between exhibitionism and insecurity provide seemingly endless ironic entertainment. Like Michael Scott from “The Office,” Marcel is a contemporary presence: lonely, sensitive, and ridden with performance anxiety (which sometimes bubbles over into hapless frustration). Perhaps the reason the mockumentary format has birthed so many of our generation’s funniest characters is that it enables us to see them ham it up for the camera: the most relatable mode, these days, that a character can inhabit.

Critics have highlighted the movie’s warmth. And it is indeed warm, but coldness seeps in around the edges. A couple breaks up ferociously, and when they reunite years later, they immediately start arguing again. (One of the two has been in Guatemala doing charity work; even this has failed to teach her serenity.) The mostly unseen documentarist (Dean Fleischer Camp) has recently divorced and can’t even bring himself to discuss it. Marcel gets Internet famous, and annoying influencers swarm his house for clout, ignoring his plea for help.

Can’t anyone get along anymore?

Maybe, and maybe not. But the real lesson of Marcel the Shell with Shoes On is that we better not stop trying, because the alternative is even worse. If that seems like a dubious message to celebrate, I agree. But only from hard truths can we get real tenderness. And maybe because of this inclusion of the lows along with the highs, I’m among the many who found this one of the most moving films of the year.

 

–Jim Andersen

For more reviews, see my review of Glass Onion: A Knives Out Story

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Glass Onion is Indeed a Stupid Mystery

**Spoilers herein**

At the climax of Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery, master detective Benoit Blanc (Daniel Craig) makes an unusual complaint. Upon identifying the culprit, a reveal that shocks no one, he exclaims, “This is a stupid mystery!” He’s frustrated with the simplicity of the case, which any layman—or, maybe more importantly, any police officer—would have correctly solved in one guess.

I, for one, think he’s on to something. Just as Blanc implies, mystery movies are supposed to challenge and test us. They should be based on clever crimes committed by clever, unseen foes. Otherwise, why would an expert detective be needed? In fact, Blanc’s presence is the only reason that we don’t guess the villain: we expect that, since Blanc is around, something trickier must be at play. But, as it turns out, there isn’t.

Writer and director Rian Johnson is very pleased with himself for this fakeout. That’s because he has social commentary in mind: he wants to show us that our misguided reverence for tycoons like Miles Bron (Edward Norton) blinds us to crimes and misdeeds going on all around us. That our corporate oligarchy is one big “glass onion,” a collection of labyrinthian layerings that actually needn’t be peeled away, since they can easily be seen through, if only we thought to look. In other words, our emperors have no clothes, and our collective assumption that they do distracts us from society’s true crooks.

That’s a fine sentiment, but, again, it’s not the reason we fall for the misdirections of this particular film. The reason is that we’re watching a movie, and we therefore expect layers, because we expect filmmakers to reward our two hours of engagement with something interesting. We don’t expect a film without layers, because such a film would obviously be a huge letdown. Johnson promises us a great mystery, disappoints us (and Blanc), and then lectures us on why giving him the benefit of the doubt was foolish. He graciously explains that if we took the bait, that proves that we’ve allowed ourselves to be brainwashed by dumb tech bros.

Johnson also wrote and directed Star Wars Episode VIII: The Last Jedi (2017), and while I’m not one of that film’s many ardent haters, I can see a discouraging pattern forming in his work. He denies us the payoff that we came to the movie expecting, then he dares to use our surprise as a teaching moment. I support defying or even criticizing one’s viewers, but wagging a finger at them for wanting the kind of movie they were promised is priggish. You’ll notice that Johnson opts to direct movies with big budgets and big stars, thereby attracting a blockbuster Hollywood audience. Being so disdainful of Hollywood expectations, perhaps he should just…make a non-Hollywood film. (Less money in that, of course.)

It’s not only at the end of the movie that Benoit Blanc expresses frustration with a lack of intellectual challenge. A pensive sage in Knives Out (2019), he in fact spends much of this film grumpily complaining about the idiocy and banality surrounding him. That makes him the one relatable character in the film, and his awareness almost salvages the experience for us. But in the end, acknowledging that you’ve made a “stupid mystery” doesn’t mean you haven’t.

 

–Jim Andersen

For more reviews, see my review of Top Gun: Maverick

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A Man Called Otto is too Timid to Resonate

A Man Called Otto, directed by Mark Forster, is a feel-good flick adapted from a popular Swedish novel by Fredrick Backman. I haven’t read the book or seen the 2015 Swedish movie adaptation, but the new American film falls squarely under the storytelling umbrella of Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol: a grump terrorizes his community, then rejoins it upon rediscovering the joys of love.

But the central casting of professional nice guy Tom Hanks telegraphs that this movie isn’t much interested in the “terrorizing” half of the equation. Indeed, Forster has stacked the deck for Otto by legitimizing his supposedly grumpy complaints in the first section of the movie. He has surrounded Otto with a carnival of newfangled weirdos in (of course) California: one neighbor, to get his daily steps in, marches up and down the block like Frosty the Snowman; another, so bad is his driving, nearly backs through his new rental house upon arriving. No one for miles, it seems, can perform basic property maintenance.

And even this neighborhood of ineffectual dopes pales in comparison to the dystopian mob that awaits outside of it: when a man falls on the train tracks at a local station, anonymous teenagers film the scene greedily for social media clout.

The problem with setting up the story like this is that it mitigates the intended emotional payoff. Whereas Ebenezer Scrooge goes from the town’s biggest miser to its biggest benefactor, Otto Anderson barely changes at all over the course of the story. He’s nice all along. Even the movie’s basic symbolism reiterates this: whereas the Grinch’s heart, for example, memorably grows three sizes, Otto’s is already secretly big. This crucial difference separates a moving, classic story from an average tearjerker.

The important dynamic is forgiveness. We love to forgive characters for their misdeeds, as we do with Scrooge, the Grinch, and many others. But if A Man Called Otto is any indication, contemporary studios doubt our capacity to do this. Otto can’t be made to commit any real misdeeds, because if he did, we wouldn’t forgive him when he tried to rectify them. He has to stand up to corporate developers, talk to his dead wife, have black friends, etc., from the beginning—because we’re apparently too sanctimonious to welcome him back into the fray if he truly stepped out of line.

This disheartening, cynical view of modern audiences is, in my opinion, inaccurate. After all, don’t we still cherish A Christmas Carol and its best spinoffs even after many years? While a vocal few might jump to cancel a protagonist after Act I, people in general are forgiving, and they can tolerate stories of misguided people who change for the better.

The unnecessary trepidation from the studio, though, has left us with something like a cross between Gran Torino (2008) and Sesame Street. With a movie about a mean old man whose meanness consists of…enforcing traffic regulations.

But maybe this is just what you’re looking for to start 2023. A Man Called Otto has positive messages, funny moments, and reflective scenes. It’s a light, enjoyable film. It just doesn’t have the courage to reach for the classic pathos of its predecessors.

 

–Jim Andersen

For more movie reviews, see my review of Top Gun: Maverick.

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Top Gun: Maverick is Tom Cruise’s Final Bow (analysis)

Tom Cruise since the mid 90’s has pioneered, or at least epitomized, a movie archetype that has helped define the most recent era of cinema: the hyper-focused, sexless action hero. Whereas action stars before him won audiences with natural charm or at least physical prowess, Cruise, who has neither, has instead built an empire around compelling viewers to watch him—through sheer dedication to giving viewers what no one else will give. Insane stunts. Mind-bending plots. Envelope-pushing pace.

Top Gun: Maverick may be his definitive work. MI5: Rogue Nation (2015) and MI6: Fallout (2018) are more inventive, but they’re also more absurd. Maverick feels like the “right” balance of implausible action and mindfulness of (if not fealty to) the laws of reality. For example, yes, the anonymous enemy neglects to guard a canyon that leads directly to their target. (They’re clearly third-world; they’ve never seen Star Wars.) But there’s enough talk about planes and tactics and losing consciousness that things still feel grounded enough.

It’s also Cruise’s most reflective film. Specifically, the plot functions as a meditation on the approaching end to his own movie stardom. Cruise’s character, Pete “Maverick” Mitchell, is dressed down by his turnkey boss: “The future is coming. And you’re not in it.” This could surely double as admonishment to Cruise himself, who, at 60, strains credibility by merely appearing in a movie like this. And Mitchell’s notorious habits—pushing limits, bucking trends, endangering himself—are Cruise’s own as an actor.

Watching the movie with this meta interpretation in mind, I wasn’t as bothered by its obvious weaknesses. For instance, Cruise, never a standout in romantic scenes, even in Jerry Maguire (1996), can’t hold up his end of the film’s halfhearted love story. Grinning stupidly throughout, he plays the part as 16, not 60. Costar Jennifer Connelly, a skilled performer in serious erotic roles, has been hired to convince us that Cruise is still sexy, or even that he used to be. The effort is futile.

But flat notes like these only reinforce the elegiac feeling that Cruise is running out of gas, that this is his last hurrah. As his character emphasizes to his trainees with curious intensity: “Time is your greatest adversary.”

Further heralding the imminent end of the line, Cruise’s costar from the original film, Val Kilmer, appears in cameo as a cancer-ridden, speech-challenged shadow of his former self. This isn’t an act: Kilmer actually has lost the power of speech amidst a real life battle with throat cancer. His character dies mid-film. Cruise stands alone.

Tom Cruise has never been an Avenger. He has never been an avatar. He has never been a wizard or a jedi or a hobbit. In an cinematic era dominated by fantasy, Cruise has planted himself stubbornly in action-hero realism. So when he and a protege take charge of an ancient F-14 plane (the protege exclaims, “This thing is so old!”), we should catch the symbolism. The meaning: they’re about to do this old school. No magic, no superpowers, no cliffhangers. Just good old fashioned shooting, ducking, and yelling. And they do it. And it works.

But Cruise is only one person, and he knows that despite his contributions, the industry has moved in a different direction. Perhaps this is why for most of the film he plays a teacher to a new generation. His mantra: what matters isn’t the equipment or even the task at hand, but rather “the person in the cockpit.” If there was ever a more grandiose statement from an actor, I’m not aware of it. (Cruise’s experiences with scientology likely haven’t done much to dampen his ego.) Exiting his role as Hollywood’s biggest action star, he wants his successors to know that they can singlehandedly drive a film—and that, by extension, he singlehandedly drove his.

That may be outlandish self-aggrandizement, but given Cruise’s output over the past two decades, how can we argue? Until he slips up, we can only admire.

Top Gun: Maverick is an entertaining throwback that pleads for successors. Will anyone answer the call? Cruise has faith: all of his students are portrayed as skilled and worthy, even the arrogant pretty boy. (Maybe especially the arrogant pretty boy, who’s possibly a version of Cruise as a young man. Indeed, evidence abounds that Cruise likes him the most.)

I have less faith. But one thing is for sure: whatever Cruise puts out in his remaining years as an actor, this is his final bow. After seeming to insist on eternal youth in the last two Mission Impossibles, he has finally surveyed his place in moviemaking and acknowledged:

“Time is your greatest adversary.”

 

–Jim Andersen

For more reviews, see my review of Tár.