This is an interesting team once again with George Clooney as director and the Coen brothers as writers to showcase a life of American suburbia in the 1950s. You can tackle so many issues as how suburban life can affect both male and female perspectives as how they work throughout the day. I thought Revolutionary Road was a prime example of how we witness a couple being bored of a life in 1950s suburbia but priorities halt their dreams of pursuing a happier life. However, after learning that director Clooney was adding things to the "dusted-off" Coen Brothers script from the 80s before they became such masterful filmmakers, it shows in the movie that Clooney tries too hard to insert humor in the narrative. He tries too hard to become the Coen directors as the tone is all over the map and is almost a complete disaster.
The movie starts with new residents moving into the neighborhood as the mailman is greeting one neighbor, Mrs. Mayers (Kamirah Westbrook) who is African-American. But, as she reveals that she and her family are the new neighbors, the mailman gets awkward and leaves. The other residents also react with horror as they point out that the neighbors are black. They are so angry that they petition to do something to remove the Mayers off the premises.
Next door, Rose Lodge and her twin sister, Margaret (both played by Julianne Moore) are the next door neighbors as Rose implores her son, Nicky (Noah Jupe) to play with the Mayers' son, Andrew (Tony Espinosa). There is an incident occurring that night as Nicky's father, Gardner (Matt Damon), tells him that a couple of people named Louis and Sloan (Alex Hassell and Glenn Fleshler) are going to rob them. Rose dies from a chloroform overdose as people around town offer their condolences to Nicky, Margaret and Gardner. But, people quietly insinuates that the Mayers had something to do with the robbery and also Rose's death.
I almost did not like this movie at all because of the tonal inconsistencies and the narrative being not as straight forward. What is clearly wrong is that Clooney wants to provide social commentary in the 1950s to parallel today's society but uses two different stories and interconnecting them with both a dark comedic style and a dramatic style to showcase a protest against African-Americans in American suburbia. But, my only question is why do you want to set a social commentary in the backdrop of a dark comedic plot involving a robbery and murder and vice versa? Both of those stories can be separate movies and they are not executed as well as they should have been.
I found none of the characters except one to be memorable, likable or even of any rooting interest. Matt Damon's character looks like a caricature of humor or a character from SNL that does not produce laughs because of his reactions to certain things because of the tone. Julianne Moore does what she can with her character but again she is not that likable or memorable. What is crazy that the Mayers family have a nice environment and is presented in a more dramatic tone than the Lodge family storyline. It is somewhat confusing as to why the Meyers family subplot is in the backseat because that is executed well but not finishes as well because they are totally absent from the movie. I'm guessing Clooney was trying to make a point that the white community was paying more attention to the white family that is making trouble than the black family being innocent. The conclusion that interconnects both families is forced but maybe leaves hope. However, the one brief but great performance from Oscar Isaac as he embodies a character that quite fits with the characters created from movies from the Coen Brothers.
Clooney does not deliver on comedy at all. I mean look at Leatherheads and The Monuments Men. Case closed. He needs to go back on handling dramatic stories. If he wants to keep continuing on with mixing comedy with drama, he acts real well in great movies like Up in the Air, The Descendants and O Brother, Where Art Thou? It is ironic that a movie like Get Out had the same sort of approach but in a different genre but it worked. Here, it is like an experiment gone wrong. Stay away from this neighborhood.
*1/2
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