MEDIOCREMOVIE.CLUB
  • Reviews
  • Side Pieces
  • Shane of Thrones
  • Podcast
  • About
  • Archives
  • Game of Thrones Fantasy

20th Century Women

9/25/2017

3 Comments

 

B+
3.44

A single mother in 1979 recruits two younger women to help her raise her teenage son.

Directed by Mike Mills
Starring Annette Bening and Lucas Jade Zumann
​Initial Review by Jon Kissel

Picture
Jimmy Carter's Crisis of Confidence speech holds a major piece of real estate in Mike Mills' semi-autobiographical film 20th Century Women.  Derided at the time but seen as somewhat prescient decades later, Carter diagnosed the country's problems in a perilous economic time and recommended a series of solutions at the macro and micro level.  He refused to coddle the country, saying that we all had a part to play in bringing things to their current state but that we also had the power, individually and communally, to improve things.  One year later, Carter would be replaced by Ronald Reagan, a man who told the country flattering lies about itself and created a culture that would only exacerbate the problems Carter talked about, pulling the country further into selfishness and consumerism.  In 20th Century Women, Reagan's so-called 'Morning in America' has not yet dawned, and the characters are all in various states of malaise.  Like Carter, they prefer honesty and hard truths to hand-waving and pleasant lies.  20th Century Women isn't going for the big moment or the grand turning point, but does the hard work of small steps.  It prefers low-key tragedies to grand victories, and defines aging as the world getting regretfully smaller but richer and deeper at the same time.

Mills already made a film about his father in Beginners.  20th Century Women, loosely about his mother, is the superior film based on its depth of cast.  Christopher Plummer, who played Papa Mills as he's coming out of the closet in the last phase of his life, was the only memorable character in Beginners whereas this film is laden with several of them.  I don't usually like narration, but here, it's used admirably to give characters context and to show how their past is informing their present.  It also doesn't hurt that the main quintet is played by some of the best actors in their cohort.
​
Leading the ensemble is Annette Bening as Dorothea, one of the great movie moms in recent memory.  All set to be a feminist icon as the first female pilot, her fame thwarted by the end of WWII.  She settles in to an average life but lives it with the same confidence that she likely would with anything else.  She serves as a guardian not just to Jamie, but to the whole community, constantly inviting people over to her home for dinner parties and taking in strays like Abbie and William.  Jamie describes her as coming from a generation that didn't admit when anything went wrong.  In some aspects, like her untended romantic life and unacknowledged loneliness, that's true, but in others, like her framing of her parenting capabilities, that's not who she is at all.  She can admit her flaws and legitimately attempt to understand her son's strange interests.  Each of the three titular characters are truth tellers but Dorothea has the most gentle and appealing way of doing so.  Mills writes her and Bening plays her as a person who justifiably draws people into her orbit, and it's a place the viewer wants to be as well. 

Two of the people she draws in are Abbie and Julie, the former as a tenant and the latter as a painfully-platonic friend for Jamie.  The films doesn't just treat them as spinning planets around Dorothea and Jamie, but as independent bodies of their own.  Both have their simmering tragedies with Abbie's ailments and Julie's alienation.  Both are unmoored from their Santa Barbara lives, with each wanting to be elsewhere.  Jamie learns valuable lessons from each about female desire and how to be simply be present for a friend.  He doesn't learn valuable lessons from Billy Crudup's William, who's used as a kind of counter-point.  His is the life of the body.  He serves a useful purpose around the house and he's able to sleep with a lot of women, but it doesn't sustain him and his relationships are doomed by the eventual realization that his partner is smarter than he is, as represented by the way Dorothea is always laughing at his crunchy advice.  The women in Jamie's life represent the life of the mind, a path that doesn't promise happiness but feels more earned.

Beginners remains a largely forgettable film in the several years since I've seen it, but when the same amount of time goes by since watching 20th Century Women, it will still occupy a piece of my cinematic memory.  This film is a coherent whole, but so many individual parts resonate as palpable, indelible moments.  The instigating incident of Jamie's fainting that prompts Dorothea to recruit Abbie and Julie to serve as co-parents is captured breathlessly and truthfully, ranging from Julie's panicked running for help to Dorothea's earnest concern and Jamie's quickness to shrug the whole thing off.  Each of the aforementioned backstories are able to hit upon a pang of melancholy, and the epilogue raised my estimation of the film considerably.  Recurring motifs like the shots of Jamie alone on his skateboard, zig-zagging down an empty street, are mesmerizing images of teen aimlessness, though other choices, like the several still photo montages, don't work as well.  20th Century Women has been on my mind continuously since I watched it a week ago, something that would have stayed true if a review was immediately forthcoming or if it went in the review backlog. 

When Dorothea is trying to understand punk rock and the universal agreement that the music itself is not what anyone would call proficient or 'good,' Abbie responds with the convincing argument that the genre is less about talent than it is about passion.  These punk bands may not have the talent to communicate their passion, but the passion is what matters.  Mills doesn't have this problem with 20th Century Women, an excellent work that beautifully captures a transitional time in a boy's life during a transitional time for the country.  A-

3 Comments
Dan M
9/26/2017 06:28:49 am

Seen as prescient only by revisionist goofs.

Reply
Bryan
9/26/2017 11:10:40 am

I saw this movie months ago and didn't take notes. I can still remember the awkwardness of the young boys relationship, the weird characters (including Frances Ha), the general feel of the home's cohesiveness, and dialogue that kept me engaged.

This is a unique story about weird people. Twitter review -> Frances Ha moves to San Francisco, isn't annoying, and moves into an Air BnB.

Reply
Cooker
9/28/2017 11:09:15 am

I enjoyed this movie, but had some minor problems with it. The awkward relationship between the son and mother was hard for me to believe at times. When Jamie leaves for L.A. to go to a concert without telling her and Dorothea (the mother) had little to no disciplinary response. I mean, it’s only set one year before I was born. Maybe my parents were just real strict. I don’t know, but I had a difficult time fathoming some of the emotional responses (or lack thereof) at times, even though the awkwardness between the two was the point.

Some of the artsy shots weren’t necessary, but I’ve always been bothered by those. If I ever get around to finishing them, I think I might add a pointless artsy montage to one of my remaining Harry Putter films, or maybe just spend five minutes to show Harry walking across the screen. I also felt at times a little disconnected as to whom the protagonist was (the mom, the son, both?). Jumping between them distracted me a little.

I did like how we got narrations of the futures of the lead characters, whom I thought were all performed well by the cast; I’ve always been a fan of Elle Fanning (and her sister). Overall, good film; probably won’t make it to the “re-watch” list, but a solid B+ from me.

Reply



Leave a Reply.

    Authors

    JUST SOME IDIOTS GIVING SURPRISINGLY AVERAGE MOVIE REVIEWS.

    Categories

    All
    2017 Catch Up Trio
    80s
    Action
    Adventure
    AI Trio
    Author - Blair
    Author - Bobby
    Author - Bryan
    Author - Chris
    Author - Cook
    Author - Drew
    Author - Joe
    Author - Jon
    Author - JR
    Author - Lane
    Author - Phil
    Author - Pierce
    Author - Sean
    Author - Shane
    Author - Tom
    Best Of 2016
    Best Of 2017
    Best Of 2018
    Best Of 2019
    Best Of 2020
    Best Of 2021
    Best Of 2022
    Comedy
    Culture Clash Trio
    Denzel Trio
    Documentary
    Drama
    Foreign
    Historical
    Horror
    Internet Docs Trio
    Mediocrities
    Movie Trios
    Musical
    Podcast
    Romance
    Round 3.1
    Round 3.2
    Round 3.3
    Round 4.1
    Round 4.2
    Round 4.3
    Sci Fi
    Season 10
    Season 2
    Season 3
    Season 4
    Season 5
    Season 6
    Season 7
    Season 8
    Season 9
    Shorts
    Sports
    Thriller
    Western
    Women In Men's Worlds

    RSS Feed

    Archives

    January 2023
    December 2022
    November 2022
    October 2022
    September 2022
    August 2022
    July 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014

    Click to set custom HTML