Craig Roberts channels Frodo Baggins.
(2016) Dramedy (Netflix) Paul Rudd, Craig Roberts, Selena Gomez, Julia Denton, Megan Ferguson, Samantha Huskey, Bobby Cannavale, Jennifer Ehle, Donna Briscoe, Alex Huff, Alex Boell, Bill Murphey, Frederick Weller, Matt Mercurio, Robert Walker Branchaud, Eric Singer, James Donaldio, Matthew Pruitt, Ashley White, Kristi Von. Directed by Rob Burnett
One of the truths about caregiving is that often the caregiver receives from their charge as much if not more than they give to them. That isn’t always the case, but most of the time we see things in those whose care we are charged with that change how we see ourselves.
Ben Benjamin (Rudd) is entering the field of caregiving after having spent most of his life as a novelist. He has been unable to write following a tragedy that left him devastated and he and his wife (Denton) on the brink of divorce. Picking up the pieces, he wants to help someone in need rather than just bag groceries or flip burgers.
His first client is Trevor (Roberts), a young man with Muscular Dystrophy and a frazzled mom (Ehle). His American dad abandoned the two of them; the two ex-pat Brits are also starting over in Seattle, with mom working for a major bank but going through caregivers as caustic Trevor is a bit of a handful, with a penchant for playing practical jokes and insulting those closest around him.
Ben urges the routine-bound Trevor to get out of the house; Trevor has a fondness for cheesy American tourist traps, particularly those things that advertise themselves as the “Biggest” anything. Ben knows that watching specials on the Travel Channel is nothing compared to seeing these plays in person in all their chintzy glory. With mom getting ready to go on a business trip to Atlanta, Ben begins planning a road trip of his own with Trevor. At first, mom is appalled but eventually relents.
They pick up a foul-mouthed hitchhiker on the way, a comely girl named Dot (Gomez) who is headed to Denver and art school. They also pick up another stray, the very pregnant Peaches (Ferguson) whose husband is overseas. On Trevor’s say-so, this ragtag group makes a detour to Salt Lake City to confront Trevor’s no-account used car dealer dad (Weller) but eventually they make it to the Nirvana of Trevor’s bucket list – America’s biggest pit. Yes, he aspires to see a tourist attraction that is essentially a great big hole in the ground.
Trevor and Ben are in fact mirror images of one another; both are bitter at the hand life has dealt them and both have been shutting out others, using their sense of humor and/or grief to push the world away from them. The caregiving has, by movie’s end, gone both ways; Ben is able to move on and Trevor is able to live life more fully. That’s a bit of a Hollywood cliché and I’m not sure that was what the Jonathan Evison novel, which I haven’t read, intended.
One of a handful of projects that played at this year’s Sundance Film Festival that was picked up for theatrical and streaming distribution by Netflix, the movie has a somewhat accelerated pace that makes one feel like Burnett (who also wrote the screenplay based on the novel) was trying to cram too much into an hour and a half. The pace of the story isn’t organic at all as the closed-off Trevor seems to accept Ben way too easily, while for his part Ben who started off the movie sullen and uncommunicative seems to open up much faster in the film than humans usually do; there’s no sense of progression, only that the filmmakers wanted the relationship to reach the stage where the road trip could begin quickly.
Rudd is one of the most charming actors in Hollywood; he is so likable onscreen that even in off-beat roles (which are often the ones he takes) he still manages to capture your rooting interest. Here, it starts off with Ben deep in the throes of depression and the character is morose and grief-stricken. It doesn’t take long for Rudd to shine through even in those extreme circumstances and in some ways that’s not a good idea; Ben’s grief is part of the central aspects of his character and he seems to pull out of it way too quickly. It isn’t until the movie ends in fact that we realize that the movie has been about Ben all along and Trevor is the caregiver; the title is about how they both learn to care about life but the focus is certainly on Ben. Rudd pulls that aspect of it off well.
The movie is riddled with cliches and is predictable throughout. Gomez with her baby face looks is somewhat miscast as the fiercely independent Dot, while the character of Peaches seems to be unnecessary baggage. Cannavale turns up in an uncredited glorified cameo as Dot’s father who turns out to be following his daughter, making sure she gets to Denver all right.
I expected a bit more out of this film than it delivered. I enjoyed the road trip dynamic but there was no build up to it that would have given the personal growth more meaning. It just seemed to be too rote for a movie that came out of the independent pedigree it had. This could have easily been a remarkable film about the nature of caregiving, but in the end the script doesn’t serve the subject matter well. Netflix subscribers who are Paul Rudd films should check it out if they haven’t already; if you can take or leave Rudd, you are well-advised to find better movies to stream on the home video giant.
REASONS TO GO: Paul Rudd is as charming as always. Some fun road film moments.
REASONS TO STAY: The pacing feels really rushed. The scrip is somewhat pedantic.-
FAMILY VALUES: Some foul language, sexually suggestive content and some adult themes.
TRIVIAL PURSUIT: Rudd and Cannavale both appeared in Ant-Man last year.
CRITICAL MASS: As of 7/20/16: Rotten Tomatoes: 78% positive reviews. Metacritic: 55/100.
COMPARISON SHOPPING: Jack of the Red Hearts
FINAL RATING: 5/10
NEXT: The BFG
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