A couple years ago, writer/director Gillian Robespierre made a splash with a little movie called “Obvious Child”. Starring indelibly funny “Parks and Recreation” actress Jenny Slate, “Obvious Child” seemed like a synthesis of shopworn scenarios at first — the sex-positive body comedy of Lena Dunham coupled with the larger culture’s ceaseless fixation on romantic New York ennui, not to mention a pregnancy-as-plot catalyst ripped straight out of Judd Apatow’s boys-will-be-boys hit “Knocked Up”.
What none of us could have predicted was how outrageously funny and deceptively radical “Obvious Child” would end up being. Whereas “Knocked Up” used its pregnancy plot to tell an amusing but by now overly familiar story of a chubby, wisecracking pothead inexplicably landing the girl of his dreams, “Obvious Child” dealt with its taboo subject in a more painful and realistic fashion. Robespierre’s gaze was undoubtedly feminine, giving “Obvious Child” a delicacy that “Knocked Up,” for all its bawdy belly laughs, lacked. And yet “Obvious Child” was also one of the funniest movies of that year: a celebration of female sexuality and the 21st century woman’s right to be a vulgar, utterly human fuck-up. It’s a film I remember three years after its release, and as far as feature-film debuts go, it’s about as assured as they come.
So I was surprised at the wave of critical backlash that greeted Robespierre’s second film, and her newest collaboration with Ms. Slate: an ebullient, big-hearted comedy called “Landline”. Some reviews have complained that the movie lacks a plot, and that its resolves its thorny psychological complexities with a kind of sitcom tidiness. Having seen Ms. Robespierre’s second film, I can see where these criticisms come from. However, to ascribe to these opinions would be to miss out on the winsome, touching humanity of the director’s sophomore feature, which is to say nothing of the movie’s hilarious, joke-a-minute script. With “Landline,” Robespierre seems to be inheriting the mantle held in previous decades by directors like Paul Mazursky, Noah Baumbach and pre-“You’ve Got Mail” Nora Ephron. She seems to have found her sweet spot making funny-sad, adroitly observed comedies about people in crisis, and “Landline” is ultimately every bit as wise, sweet and memorable as her debut.
The title “Landline” is blockily allusive, but it does indicate that Ms. Robespierre’s latest effort is something of a period film. “Landline” takes place in 1995, and it occasionally overreaches in its attempt to constantly remind the audience that what they are watching takes place in the not-so-distant past.
That being sadi, I believe Robespierre’s decision to set the movie’s action in this very specific point in time has a sly purpose. “Landline” is flush with rich, autobiographical touches, from the clothes the characters wear, a beautifully observed scene in which two daughters stake out their father’s workplace looking for his mistress, or a later gag in which a mother, in an attempt to coerce respect out of her co-workers, wears a replica of Hillary Clinton’s pink pillbox suit to a board meeting. There is a startling specificity in “Landline” that transcends bland sitcom descriptors, and elevates it to a deeper, more innately satisfying realm.
One of the things I enjoyed most about “Landline” is quite simple: the fact that it is about imperfect, recognizably human people simply trying to get their shit together. It’s been a great movie summer, don’t get me wrong, but it’s also been one that’s been somewhat short on actual human beings. We’ve had marooned troops and nationalist ciphers in “Dunkirk,” genetically-enhanced pigs in “Okja,” gun-wielding apes, super-cool getaway drivers, Tom Cruise, devious Southern belles, and, uh, the Transformers. Absorbing all these films (some of which are quite excellent), it can be easy to wonder: where have all the real people gone?
While some of the story beats in “Landline” might seem tedious to those who aren’t enraptured with the sexual behaviors and temper tantrums of upscale New Yorkers, the film also depicts ordinary, quotidian situations — a half-hearted attempt at sex in the woods, smoking cigarettes in the bathroom, a Halloween parade, etc. — with an accuracy and insight that’s rare in contemporary comedy. What’s more is that “Landline” establishes Robespierre (as well as Elisabeth Holm, who co-wrote this new film, and also has both a producing and story credit for “Obvious Child”) as one of the sharpest comic writers working independent cinema today. There are zingers for days in “Landline” that, in spite of the narrative’s occasional proclivity for cutesiness, cut to the bone of some pretty heavy issues.
In “Landline,” Slate plays a similar character to her bed-hopping firestarter in “Obvious Child”. Her Dana Jacobs is a lovable but occasionally appalling creation: unafraid to say what’s on her mind at any given time, which can be both a charming and immensely frustrating quality. We are soon introduced to Dana’s family, which includes stern, loving mother Pat (the indispensable Edie Falco), father Alan (national treasure John Turturro), a failing playwright who makes a living writing copy for snack foods, and surly little sister Ali (memorable newcomer Abby Quinn), who’s ditching school and smoking heroin at New York after-hours clubs when the movie begins.
Dana is trapped in a safe but loveless relationship with a reliable dweeb named Ben (Jay Duplass), and our heroine’s wayward attraction to a square-jawed stranger played by Finn Wittrock does not bode well for the couple’s pending engagement. In both “Obvious Child” and now “Landline,” Robespierre has paired Slate with male counterparts who are old-school movie-star handsome, and while some narrow-minded viewers might see the pairing as incongruous, I saw it as a welcome female counterpoint to the infantile wish-fulfillment of so many of today’s man-child comedies.
“Landline” takes a dark turn when Ali discovers some incriminating messages, seemingly written by her father, on an old floppy desk. Addressed to a lover only referred to as “C,” the notes are filled with acrimonious details, like how Alan refers to his genitalia as “dough” and implores his temptress to address him as the “Pillsbury Doughboy”. Of course, Dana shares her sister’s ire over her father’s betrayal, but her own reasoning is not that simple. Over the course of “Landline”, Dana strays away from her static life with Ben and finds herself drawn into the arms of Wittrock’s charismatic dude-bro, making her the second member of her family to commit adultery.
It is as this point that “Landline” becomes something far more rewarding than yet another comedy about a beautiful young woman failing her way through New York City. Simply put, “Landline” is a probing yet accessible examination of the reasons people lie to each other, executed with the punchy panache of a good short story. And like any movie that draws from a deep well of personal inspiration, “Landline” does occasionally feel too insular and too specific to the experiences of those who wrote it to register as universal. Which is fine — like Woody Allen, Robespierre seems to be specialize in comic cautionary tales that no one else but her could tell. That said, some of the criticisms about the neatness of the movie’s resolution are not inaccurate. Robespierre is too nice to really take these accident-prone, self-obsessed people to task, and while the movie is never anything less than effervescent, it sometimes lacks the bite that gave “Obvious Child” its prescient edge.
Not surprisingly, Slate is remarkable in her second collaboration with the director. She’s truly one of the best screen comediennes we have, and a scene late in the movie where she drunkenly tries to light a cigarette is almost Chaplinesque in its physical detail. Turturro makes a character who might be loathsome in the hands of another actor strangely lovable, and a scene he shares with Slate about two-thirds of the way through the movie at a Hibachi restaurant movingly sums up some of the movie’s preoccupying themes without putting too fine of a point on it. Abby Quinn is appropriately blunt and snotty, evoking the recklessness of teen rebellion, and Jay Duplass does a sturdy riff on the New Age/Nice Guy archetype as Slate’s white-bread beau.
However, the MVP of the movie for me was Edie Falco, which should be no surprise to anyone who’s been paying attention to the quietly mesmerizing work she’s been doing over the years. It is crucial for “Landline” that this character be memorable, strong and have agency in the story, and Falco supplies all three of those things in abundance. Her will and resolve, as always, is a miracle to behold — she’s certainly more composed than her lying husband — and as she did in “The Sopranos,” Falco conveys maternal worry better than just about any actress currently working.
“Landline” doesn’t provide the jaw-dropping spectacle of some of the summer’s biggest mainstream successes (“Dunkirk,” “Baby Driver,” etc.) but it’s not meant to. Like Michael Showalter’s “The Big Sick,” it’s a movie that nimbly bounces from being adorable to being genuinely agonizing, using light comedy to explore deep issues. There will be those for whom the film is too mild, and also those who simply aren’t interested in yet another melancholy farce about flighty New Yorkers and their family problems. Those criticisms are valid. What’s also valid is the depth of texture and detail in “Landline,” and the compassion and commitment of its central performances. I, for one, am grateful to have Gillian Robespierre in our current moviegoing climate, and I hope she and Slate continue making movies together for a long, long time.
The Hasidic community of New York City has never been the most welcoming to outsiders. It’s also never been the sexiest subject when it comes to cinema. Artists ranging from Woody Allen to Jill Soloway have wrestled with the concept of what it means to be Jewish in the public sphere, but has anyone provided a look into the Orthodox community that was unburdened by a goy’s outlier perspective?
I’m hard pressed to think of any recent film that provides a clear-eyed and honest look at this particular sect of Judaism (the Jesse Eisenberg-starring drug drama “Holy Rollers” doesn’t count, mostly because the fact that the main characters are Hasidm is mostly incidental). This is only one of the things that makes Joshua Weinstein’s moving new film “Menashe” so surprising.
A tender and observant slice of life about a well-meaning but ineffectual Hasidic man struggling against the traditions of his people and doing his best to raise his son, “Menashe” may not offer plot or obvious drama to divert viewers with short attention spans. And yet, what this movie sets out to do is not easy: it is the story of a man who goes about life with a quiet dignity, fighting against his imperfections in a world that very may well leave him behind.
There is no real action to speak of in “Menashe” and not much in the way of plot beyond a memorial service, a father-son story and the untimely death of a baby chicken. Like last year’s “Paterson,” directed by Jim Jarmusch, “Menashe” is a film enamored with the textures of everyday life. It is also an unapologetic art film with a keen ear for the Jewish vernacular that offers a look inside an insulated community and emerges with themes that are both resonant and universal.
“Menashe” was filmed in the Borough Park neighborhood of Brooklyn, home to one of the highest concentration of Orthodox Jews outside of Israel. The lead character is also played by a mostly non-tested actor named Menashe Lustig, who insists that the film’s script is partially based off his life. Mr. Lustig, somewhat understandably, has also gone to some lengths to assure viewers that he’s not as hapless and devil-may-care as “Menashe’s” protagonist.
The film lives and dies on his shoulders: Lustig is in practically every scene of “Menashe,” and first-time director Weinstein trusts his leading man to anchor the movie’s intentionally minor developments through his affable, world-weary presence. Though “Menashe” is certainly a languid sit and the film’s ambiguous final moments may very well leave less intuitive audience members bewildered, the film is also a warm-hearted and refreshingly subdued look at the clash of spiritual responsibility with daily life’s more practical demands.
The movie’s opening shot is a wonder: a sea of Hasid’s spilling onto the street, all black hats and bristly white beards and guarded reserve. Only one Hasid does not wear his signature religious garb: that would be Menashe, the local neighborhood lug, and father of a precocious young boy named Rieven (newcomer Ruben Nidorski).
Menashe’s countenance is not dissimilar to that of a friendly bear: he seems to lumber about, doing his best to remain cheerful, even when he’s getting hassled by his boss at his drab convenience store job, or waking up late to take his kid to school. No matter what obstacles may stand in his way on any given day, Menashe is determined to deal with them all with a kind of practiced bemusement. Unlike some other iconic Jewish characters in other works of pop culture, it’s hard to imagine Menashe getting worked up over anything.
Not that our bearded, pot-bellied hero doesn’t have life stuff to stress over. We come to learn that Menashe is a recent widower, and his attempts to organize his wife’s memorial service are about as successful as his half-hearted attempts to get back into his community’s cloistered dating scene. Menashe’s brother-in-law, Eizik (Yoel Weisshaus), is condescending and snide and doesn’t believe that his brother can do a damn thing right. Even our hero’s attempts to make Kugel for his friends don’t go as planned. In between his procession of small failures, Menashe finds fleeting happiness where he can — in a delicious hero sandwich he engulfs after a late work shift, or a night spent drinking 40 ounces with the Hispanic men who stock the shelves in his store.
Not surprisingly, “Menashe” thrives in its quiet moments. Like the Joshua and Benny Safdie’s more frenetic, hard-edged genre piece “Good Time,” “Menashe” is a New York film down to the bone: you get the sense that no one from out of state could have made it, at least not this way. Weinstein understands these people, and what’s more is that he understands the tricky layers of contradictory dogma that constitute the often arcane ideologies of Orthodox Judaism. Most of “Menashe” sees its title character butting heads with the outmoded rules of his faith: a struggle that the film’s lead actor conveys with heartwarming good humor and an utterly natural screen presence.
In this landscape of blockbusters, remakes and Marvel movies, small, character-focused movies like “Landline” and “Menashe” can be easy to overlook. These are not films that get pushed hard by their respective studios, and only the most committed of movie-lovers will be inclined to seek them out. My advice? Expose yourself to these films while you still can. Though they may not offer some of the more basic pleasures of multiplex moviegoing — action, set pieces, cheeky cameos, titillation, broad humor, etc. — they are complexand captivating films that have the capacity to teach us about ourselves. As the immortal Roger Ebert once said: what are movies if not machines for generating empathy?
Grades: “Landline” and “Menashe,” B+.
