Jack and I quite liked this unexpectedly funny story of an aging couple, him in and out of dementia, her with other issues, on a road trip before it's too late, in their Winnebago called the Leisure Seeker. Helen Mirren (last blogged for Trumbo, she was born in 1945) is great as Ella, the mostly patient caregiver who loves to talk (in a Southern accent this time). Donald Sutherland (born in 1935, he first came to my attention in M.A.S.H. (1970) and I've enjoyed his work in, among others, Klute (1971), Ordinary People (1980), Heaven Help Us (1985), Six Degrees of Separation (1993), Disclosure (1994), Space Cowboys (2000), The Italian Job (2003), Fierce People (2005), Pride & Prejudice (2005), Horrible Bosses, and, just today I watched the excellent pilot episode of the FX mini-series Trust in which he plays J. Paul Getty) is also wonderful as John who can go from lucid to blank in the blink of an eye.
As their son Will, Christian McKay (in Me and Orson Welles he played Welles) is good but has not mastered an American accent as well as his English countrywoman Mirren. Janel Maloney (best known for 150 episodes of The West Wing, she did good work in Concussion and four episodes of Alpha House, to name a few) brings life to their daughter Jane. The neighbor Lillian is veteran character actor Dana Ivey (born in 1941). I love how, nowadays, the filmmakers are able to use vintage photos of the actual actors in the old pictures of their characters. There are quite a few of Ivey, Mirren, and Sutherland shown during the course of this movie. Watch for a surprising cameo by Dick Gregory (who died in August 2017 at age 84) late in the second act.
This is the first fully English language film for director/co-writer Paolo Virzì (and the first of his work that I've seen), who adapted the 2009 novel by Michael Zadoorian with co-writers Stephen Amidon, Francesca Archibugi, and Francesco Piccolo (all new to me).
Cinematographer Luca Bigazzi (most recently in these pages for Youth) provides beautiful photography, shot mostly in Georgia and Florida.
The director's brother Carlo Virzì has given us a lovely original soundtrack that is available for sale on the usual outlets and can be streamed on spotify. When we saw this a week ago I counted seventeen songs in the credits. There is no list available but I remember some and some I got by using by OCD powers for good and scanning the screenplay which turned up on about the tenth page of my search (note, not every word in the script made it to the screen): Me and Bobby McGee by Janis Joplin, Laughing by David Crosby, It's Too Late by Carole King, If You Leave Me Now by Chicago, Don't Leave Me This Way by Thelma Houston, Be My Baby by The Ronettes, If It's Magic by Stevie Wonder, Magic Moments by Perry Como.
The critics and audiences of Rotten Tomatoes are hating on this one, averaging 33 and 52% respectively. If the topic doesn't push painful buttons for you, spite those critics and enjoy this one.
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