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, where I don’t think I’ve missed much anyway, but better options are on the horizon. (Note: Anything in bold blue below [some may look near purple] is a link to something more in the review.)
My reviews’ premise: “You can’t please everyone, so you got to please yourself.”
(from "Garden Party" by Rick Nelson and the Stone Canyon Band, 1972 album of the same name)
May December (Todd Haynes) rated R 117 min.
Here’s the trailer:
(Use the full screen button in the image’s lower right to enlarge its size;
activate the same button or use “esc” keyboard key to return to normal.)
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.
(My apologies for sameness of photos used in this review, but I had precious little to choose from.)
What Happens: In 2015 well-known-TV actor Elizabeth Berry (Natalie Portman) gets a movie role to play real-life-scandal-woman Gracie Atherton-Yoo (Julianne Moore), who 18 years ago had a sexual affair with 13-year-old Joe Yoo (Charles Melton)—of half-Korean heritage he notes—when they were both working at a pet store in the summer of 1992, with her being 36 at the time (but he later says she wasn’t his first). They were caught going at in the storeroom, she went to jail for 5 years, then married Joe (he was 18) when she was released. To further complicate things, Gracie was married at the time to Tom Atherton (D.W. Moffett), had 3 kids of her own, with one of them, Georgie (Cory Michael Smith) being Joe’s classmate (Gracie divorced Tom while in the cooler). Now, Joe’s 36, Gracie’s 59, they have 3 kids—Honor (Piper Curda), who’s in college, twin high-school seniors, Charlie (Gabriel Chung) and Mary (Elizabeth Yu), approaching graduation—with Elizabeth about to descend on them in Savannah, GA, to research her upcoming role. While we see a scrapbook of newspaper headlines about the scandal (Honor's born while Gracie's in prison), Joe and Gracie seemed to have moved comfortably on with their lives, despite the occasional box of turds left anonymously on their front steps that Elizabeth discovers to her shock, just as she arrives.
Elizabeth spends a lot of time with the Atherton-Yoo family, the parents hoping the upcoming movie will provide a more-positive-interpretation of their situation (something along the lines of “true love wins out”) while the younger trio of kids aren’t so sure this is even a good idea, with Honor—who comes home to participate in her siblings’ graduation—opposed to the entire concept of the film. Nevertheless, Elizabeth is determined to find her way into Gracie’s persona, so she meets with Tom, then goes to the pet store where the owner tells her Gracie specifically requested a young male assistant back before the scandal emerged, then Elizabeth goes to the storeroom and (fully clothed) simulates the sexual encounter. We begin to see there are other ongoing complexities with these characters as Elizabeth finds herself attracted to Joe (she notes they’re both 36 [apparently a crucial number within this script], that he’d probably be more comfortable with someone closer to his age), while Joe, who has a hobby of raising monarch butterflies, has text conversations with his friend Michaela, proposes they take a holiday together, until she rebuffs him because of his marital status.
Shortly before the high-school graduation, Elizabeth agrees to speak to the drama class at Mary and Charlie’s school, with Mary in the group, when questions come from the students about playing sex scenes with other actors in front of crew members (she says it begins as mechanical yet can become more intense, personal), why she’d be interested in playing morally-ambiguous-characters (they intrigue her more than intended-heroic-types); Mary’s upset at listening to all this, insists Elizabeth take her home. After a dinner with the family the night before graduation, Georgie proposes to Elizabeth that in return for making him the music supervisor of the upcoming film he’ll give her dirt on how Gracie was abused by her brothers, but this whole business disturbs Elizabeth quite a bit. Then, things take an even-more-complicated turn when Joe drives Elizabeth to her motel, she invites him in, they have sex, he gives her a letter Gracie wrote to him early in their entanglement. She refers to Joe and Gracie’s life as a “story" which upsets him so he leaves angrily.
Joe goes home, confronts Gracie that maybe when they started up he was too young to know what he was doing; she counters he was the one in charge, they’re both upset with how these events are evolving. Next, we have a powerful scene where Elizabeth practices channeling Gracie as she reads the letter into a mirror (which we see as her directly facing the camera in a powerful manner, reminding me of one of the final scenes of Ingmar Bergman’s masterpiece, Persona [1966] where Nurse Alma [Bibi Andersson] recites life secrets to patient Eiisabet Volger [Liv Ullmann] with Alma facing the camera, then she does it again with the camera focused on silent, distraught Elisabet), with the revelation at the end of the letter that Joe was supposed to burn it once he’d read it. ⇒After the graduation ceremony, Elizabeth says goodbye to Gracie who denies Georgie’s claim about her brothers molesting her when she was 12. As the film we’re watching ends we see Elizabeth in her film doing several takes of a scene where she seduces actor Joe in the storeroom; while the director’s satisfied, she asks for just one more take to fully get into the essence of her character.⇐
So What? A couple of things in theaters for awhile are now available on streaming (although both are $19.99 rentals, which gives me pause yet I’ll probably see both quite soon anyway), but last weekend I passed up What Happens Later (Meg Ryan; starring Ryan, David Duchovny) and The Holdovers (Alexander Payne; starring Paul Giamatti, Da’Vine Joy Randolph, Dominic Sessa) in favor of May December because the combination of Haynes (I still marvel at his fantasy-biography of Bob Dylan in I’m Not There [2007; with an especially-impactful version of mid-‘60s Dylan by Cate Blanchett]), Moore, and Portman—plus great support from the CCAL (more on that shortly)—led me to May … . Besides, if you wander into Netflix to see it, even if you have to pay for a month’s rental, you can also explore others I’ve recently addressed on that platform: Reptile (Grant Singer; review in our October 26, 2023 posting), The Killer (David Fincher; review in our November 15, 2023 posting), Rustin (George C. Wolfe; review in our November 23, 2023 posting), and Frybread Face and Me (Billy Luther; review in our November 29, 2023 posting)—not that I have any kickback-deal with Netflix (wish I did), it’s just the location of what’s been most appealing to me lately, all of these I rated as 4 stars except The Killer which earned 3½ stars (despite my ongoing respect for Fincher’s work).
What I found in May December didn’t surprise me relative to the previous body of Haynes’ films in terms of quality presentation, but the ongoing narrative is pleasantly unexpected regarding how the scandal regarding Gracie (Joe’s presented long after the fact as just as culpable—despite his age at the time of the affair—but our patriarchal society is primed to come down harder on the woman involved, which is certainly the case here) isn’t the true focus of this story (although it’s always on the back burner, from the time Elizabeth first encounters the box of poop at Gracie’s home to the point near the end when both Joe and Gracie finally show their regrets about the more-sordid-aspects of how their connection came together), but, rather, this becomes a fascinating cluster of character-studies marvelously-well-supported by quality acting demonstrated by Moore, Portman, and Melton.
Various reviews note how this story seems to be somewhat-inspired by the actions of Mary Kay Letourneau, a married teacher who began an affair with a 13-year-old student in 1997, served 7 years in prison for statutory rape, divorced her husband, married the kid in 2005 after she was released (he was 21, she was 43), died in 2020, although this film shifts the dynamic away from the woman’s life of scandal (where Gracie tries to act as if she’s moved past being impacted by it) to the interactions between Gracie and Elizabeth, implying Elizabeth harbors her own indiscreet-tendencies as she gives unsubtle-hints to Joe that he might well be better off with her (if that’s even an authentic implication, one of many aspects of this film that deserve post-screening-consideration). Everything works effectively here (in a creepy sort of way), well-deserving of my usual high, 4 of 5 stars relative to anything else I’ve seen (higher numbers reserved for truly powerful accomplishments—like I’m Not There [although no official stars, because I’ve never actually reviewed it, my own requirement]).
Bottom Line Final Comments: As I’ve noted in some of those recent Two Guys postings referenced in the previous section of this review, when Netflix is involved in film distribution the product is released into a limited number of theaters (only one “near” me is in the north part of the San Francisco Bay Area)—in the case of May December that happened domestically (U.S.-Canada) on November 17, 2023—likely to maintain eligibility for awards structures that require some theatrical presence prior to consideration, but they don’t report what income the film may have (though they do allow notice of international income, which in this case based on 6 countries in Europe, Asia, Africa amounts to only about $407.4 thousand by my “press” time) so the focus becomes mostly on streaming availability, which began on December 1, 2023, forcing you to be a Netflix subscriber to see it (as noted before, you can sign up for just 1 month for $6.99 if you can tolerate ads, $15.49 ad-free), which I encourage you to do, both for the sake of experiencing May December and to see those other films on Netflix that I noted above during your month’s indulgence.
The CCAL’s in on this recommendation: Rotten Tomatoes reviews are 92% positive (based on a few hundred opinions, so they’re truly in support), while the Metacritic average score is 85% (a notable-high for them). The situations here are more complex than they first seem on the surface with Gracie claiming Joe was the one in charge of their affair, Joe being seduced by Elizabeth (is she truly attracted to him or is she trying to fully get into character regarding her upcoming portrayal of Gracie?) causing him to challenge himself over how responsible he was (still is?) about his involvement with Gracie, Gracie trying to keep a calm, detached demeanor after all these years with her notably-younger-lover (maybe I’ll toss in a semi-Musical Metaphor here for Gracie, with The Eagles’ "Lyin' Eyes" [on their 1975 One of These Nights album] with the gender roles reversed from what’s in the song lyrics, but even then she might see herself as “the same old girl you used to be”).
Well, enough from me at this point so I’ll just close out as usual with the official Musical Metaphor for this film, although it took me quite awhile to come up with something relevant; in fact, you may not agree with the relevancy of my choice, so feel free to suggest something better in the Comments option at the far end of this posting. Anyway, what I’ll offer you is the end of the long medley on Side 2 (vinyl original, not CD version) of The Beatles’ Abbey Road album (1969) that contains the woven-together-songs “Golden Slumbers/Carry That Weight/The End” at https://www.youtube.com/watch ?v=VZhWYD4VHZY, although I couldn’t find just this small cluster by the full Beatles foursome so this version is from a Paul McCartney 2013 Tokyo concert (if you’d like the entire original 16:40 medley here it is [sorry, but ads interrupt at 6:00, 10:44], plus the quick “Her Majesty” following the medley). As I see (hear) it, certain lyrics here speak to situations in May December, for example “Once there was a way to get back homeward / Once there was a way to get back home / Sleep, pretty darling/ Do not cry and I will sing a lullaby” conjures up a sense of Joe trying to comfort Gracie when the trauma of their lives together overwhelms her in their private time because both of them are “[…] gonna carry that weight / Carry that weight a long time.” Accordingly, the interactions of Gracie and Elizabeth amount to each of them saying to the other something to the effect of “I never give you my pillow / I only send you my invitations / And in the middle of a celebration I break down.” How this all works out for the 3 primary characters here (and, somewhat in the background, the 6 kids Gracie’s given birth to in her life) feels to me like “And in the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make.” Or, at least, the love you take needs to be balanced with all the love you make, but that equation’s still a work in progress for most all that we meet in this effectively-unnerving-film.
SHORT TAKES
Related Links Which You Might Find Interesting:
Some options: (1) What's new on Netflix in December 2023; (2) What's new on Amazon Prime Video in December 2023; (3) What's new on Hulu in December 2023; (4) What's new on Disney+ in December 2023; (5) What's new on Max in December 2023 (with Barbie on Dec. 15)
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