(not a direct quote from the film although in proper context with it)
Reviews and Comments by Ken Burke
I invite you to join me on a regular basis to see how my responses to current cinematic offerings compare to the critical establishment, which I’ll refer to as either the CCAL (Collective Critics at Large) if they’re supportive or the OCCU (Often Cranky Critics Universe) when they go negative. However, due to COVID concerns I’m mostly addressing streaming options with limited visits to theaters even though I’ll have to sacrifice seeing such wonders as Cocaine Bear (Elizabeth, Banks). Before delving into what is likely my last review of a 2022 movie, though, I’ll remind you that you can revisit my 2023 Oscars posting, which has now been updated with the winners (so you can compare them to my previous predictions/preferences), plus a few final comments about the results.
Here’s the trailer (an extended version [9:56], using the opening scenes):
(Use the full screen button in the image’s lower right to enlarge it; activate
that same button or use the “esc” keyboard key to return to normal size.)
If you’d like to see a more conventional (and shorter [2:39]) trailer as well, here it is.
If you can abide plot spoilers read on, but this blog’s intended for those who’ve seen the film or want to save some $ (as well as recognizing those readers like me who just aren’t that tech-savvy). To help any of you who want to learn more details yet avoid these all-important plot-reveals I’ll identify any give-away sentences/sentence-clusters with colors plus arrows:
⇒The first and last words will be noted with arrows and red.⇐ OK, now continue on if you prefer.
What Happens: A Man Called Otto (click on the 3 little lines in the link's upper left for more info) is set in a Pittsburgh suburb (an ironic location as this protagonist is so radically different from Pittsburg guy Fred Rogers who Tom Hanks portrayed in A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood [Marielle Heller, 2019; review in our December 11, 2019 posting]) where retiree Otto Anderson (Hanks) is a miserable man both because his departure from a steel plant was largely forced on him and he’s angry over the death of his wife, Sonya (Rachel Keller, seen in flashbacks when they were young, deeply in love [Tom’s son, Truman Hanks, is Otto in these scenes], although he faced a personal crisis years ago when he tried to enlist in the Army but was rejected because of his enlarged heart). Otto lives in a small cluster of condos with the street they all face semi-blocked-off with swingable-gates so parking’s available only to the residents; even though he was also forced off his previous position of chair of the neighborhood association, he continues to impose his restrictions on every violation he sees (or perceives) from his neighbors or delivery people, treating them all with a grumpy attitude that shows no willingness to listen to any response to his daily harassments. However, his true focus as this point is to commit suicide, which proves unsuccessful as his attempt at hanging fails when the hook he puts in the ceiling is pulled out when he hops off a stool, then when he tries carbon monoxide poisoning in his garage he’s interrupted by new neighbor Marisol (Mariana Treviño)—a renter who’s just moved across the street with husband Tommy (Manuel Garcia-Rulfo) and daughters Luna (Christiana Montoya) and Abby (Alessandra Perez)—because she needs a ride to the hospital where’s Tommy’s been taken after falling off a ladder loaned by Otto.
His next attempt at ending it all is to jump in front of a commuter train, but that’s interrupted by an old man who faints, falls onto the tracks, so Otto rescues him, barely gets back on the platform before the train pulls in, with a video someone took of the event going viral. Later, Otto begrudgingly agrees to teach Marisol to drive, then tells her about a friend, Reuben (Peter Lawson Jones), whom he’s had a falling-out with, has suffered a stroke, lives nearby cared for by wife Anita (Juanita Jennings) and adult son Jimmy (Cameron Britton). Otto finally begins to loosen up a bit, taking in a stray cat he’d previously shooed away (Anita tried to adopt, Jimmy was allergic), then allows transgender teen Malcolm (Mack Bayda) to sleep over both because the kid’s father’s thrown him out and Malcolm tells Otto Sonya was his supportive teacher. Otto’s not all smiles, though, as he pushes away social media journalist Shari Kenzie (Kelly Lamor Wilson) who wants to follow up on the train station video, then tries suicide by shotgun but is interrupted by Malcolm. Then Otto gets helpful again, learning condo owners are about to force Reuben into a nursing home after learning Anita has Parkinson’s, followed by him telling Marisol that Sonya died after their trip to Niagara Falls when their bus crashed, so she was paralyzed, had a miscarriage, passed away. ⇒Anita and Reuben are allowed to stay due to Otto’s efforts, but Otto collapses, is taken to the hospital where he lists Marisol as next of kin so she’ll inherit his condo, car, and bank accounts, then she goes into labor delivering a baby boy. Later Tommy and Marisol discover Otto dead from his heart problem.⇐
So What? This film represents a nice cluster of transformations from the original 2012 novel by Fredrik Backman as it has previously been made into a Swedish film named A Man Called Ove (Hannes Holm, 2015; nominated in 2017 for the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar)—same title as the novel—with this latest version further adapted by screenwriter David Magee. While this will come as no surprise to regular readers of this blog (of which there are several thousand worldwide, according to Google, but most of what I get in response to these postings are spam attempts to attach promotional links to various products—the reason why I see every attempt at a comment before I allow it to go public), I haven’t read/watched either of these previous versions, but based on summaries I’ve explored (thanks, Wikipedia!) this version is quite reflective of the earlier ones with just a few names, nationalities, and other minor details changed, so if the concept intrigues you and you’d rather see locations in the U.S. northeast rather than Scandinavia, then the current version would likely be a good choice (otherwise, Holm’s movie sounds great too, with CCAL support at 91% from Rotten Tomatoes, 70% from Metacritic). Of course, if this story feels a bit too sentimental for you (certainly not in the early going where Otto’s grouchiness is presented as funny [as long as you’re not on the receiving end of his complaints], yet becomes increasingly tender so as it moves along) you could find other tales of irascible elders, such as one with a more-consistent-comic-plot (where the 2 lead males are in constant conflict more so than visiting their bad humor on neighbors) in Grumpy Old Men (Donald Petrie, 1993) with a truly-commanding-cast of Walter Matthau, Jack Lemmon, Ann-Margaret, Burgess Meredith, Daryl Hannah, Kevin Pollak, Ossie Davis, and Buck Henry—comes with a sequel, Grumpier Old Men (Howard Deutch, 1995), with some of the original stars back, joined by Sophia Loren (choose carefully, though, because the first of these 2 had 64% positive RT reviews, a 53% MC average score, while the second dropped to an RT 21%, MC 46%).
Or, If you might prefer a more-consistently-serious-presentation of an old grouch, then there’s Gran Torino (Clint Eastwood, 2008) with some relatively-recognizable-plot-parallels to … Otto including a planned death but with greater purpose than Otto’s angry desperation (except for the … Ove film, this one worked best for the CCAL with 81% positive at RT, 72% MC average score). Given these references to earlier versions of similar narrative approaches in … Otto, I most admit the story elements/developments will likely seem predictable; however, I’ll propose that any of us have had days, if not years, where events that have befallen us put us into the sour mental frame Otto carries around, so I think it’s useful to watch an exploration of challenging the stimulus for those rotten feelings, finding a strategy to move beyond them before we do damage to ourselves or others; further, I’ve never considered the time invested in watching Tom Hanks on screen (even as Col. Parker in Elvis [Baz Luhrmann, 2022; review in our July 7, 2022 posting], despite a lot of rejection of that role by others) to be wasted effort, as he’s such a marvelous actor with Otto as another success.
Bottom Line Final Comments: A Man Called Otto opened domestically on December 29, 2022, then expanded in January 2023 with its widest release coming to 3,957 theaters (to date bringing in $64 million, $109 million worldwide); as it’s still in 347 of them you might have a chance to see it on the big screen somewhere in your area, but, more likely, you could turn to streaming where JustWatch would show you $5.99 rental options at Amazon Prime Video, Apple TV+, etc.; of course, if you decided to watch it like I did last weekend (as my only viewing choice in addition to the Oscars broadcast and a couple of desperately-needed-basketball-victories by my local [San Francisco Bay Area] Golden State Warriors [over on-paper-better-teams at that]) you’d have—like me—had only the option of buying it for $14.99 (I bought), so now you can choose whether you want to put it into your personal video library or not. However, the CCAL would just barely encourage either option as the RT positive reviews sit as 69% while the MC average score is an even-less-encouraging 51% (more details in Related Links down below, as with anything I'll explore in any detail in my postings).
To get an idea of what’s powering aspects of the negative voices here’s Peter Travers of ABC TV’s Good Morning America: “But this risk-free, rigorously conventional adaptation of the Swedish bestseller and Oscar-nominated 2015 foreign-language film, ‘A Man Called Otto,’ follows the broad strokes of a glaringly obvious plot that can be seen from outer space. […] With a lesser actor than Hanks, the movie would suck you down into sentimental quicksand. Even with Hanks, the gooey stuff is hard to hold back. But if all you're looking for in a movie during these stressful times is harmless fluff, then ‘A Man Called Otto’ delivers the goods.” Although I’m more in line with Katie Walsh of the Tribune News Service: “[…] a story about the loss of human connection in a modernized and rapidly changing world, and the effort it takes to knit a community through the ties that bind: personal ones. It is also a story about the transformative nature of grief, and the beauty and cruelty of life lived in moments both mundane and monumental. [¶] If these lessons are all a little bit obvious, and somewhat maudlin, well, yes, they are, in ‘A Man Called Otto,’ but that doesn’t make them any less effective.” Overall, I enjoyed it quite a bit, hope you might as well, as I leave you with my usual Musical Metaphor, this time The Beatles’ “Nowhere Man” (on 1965 UK Rubber Soul, 1966 US Yesterday and Today) found at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8scSwaKbE64 (an album version, but you might also like a live performance, although the sound quality’s a bit lacking) as lyrics like “Sitting in his nowhere land / Making all his nowhere plans for nobody” sounds like Otto to me, although when he’s able to “Leave it all ‘till somebody else lends you a hand” it does get better for him, and for us as we watch his slow evolution, although you might want to consider the Holm or Eastwood films noted above as well (only the latter of which I can really speak/advocate for directly).
SHORT TAKES
Related Links Which You Might Find Interesting:
Here are just a couple of options to explore, regarding aspects of the Oscars: (1) Oscar choices and broadcast were safe, conventional; & (2) Historic night for Asians at Oscar ceremony.
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