Read more of Hal's reviews HERE

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The Squid and the Whale  

Directed & Written by: Noah Baumbach
Starring: Jeff Daniels, Laura Linney, Jesse Eisenberg, Owen Kline, William Baldwin, Halley Feiffer, Anna Paquin.
Country: USA.

              


Three squid, half a whale

Reviewed by Hal Gray

The Stickiness of Life.

Squid is a delightfully uneasy film to watch. There’s no time to snuggle into your padded, neo-theatre-style chair as each uneasy moment follows another forcing you to shift uncomfortably looking for the moment that allows you to pause and find the sweet spot under your bum. It never comes.

All this is quite heartening in my eyes, because Squid, a Samuel Goldwyn Jr. production, and thus a ‘Hollywood’ movie, is about something more than air-brushed tits and phallic guns. It’s about real people, i.e., plausible people, and we praise the filmmaker and the producer for the attempt. That none of the characters are particularly likeable—but certainly recognizable—is also courageous.

The story is a four-hander. A writer of sometime promise, now bitter and forgotten, is left by his wife, a new writer on the way up. Their children, two boys, 16 and 12, are devastated by the split. And in another bold decision, at least in terms of box office, the main story is about the boys.

Director/writer Noah Baumbach uncompromisingly peels away this autobiographical farce with semi-tragic overtones. No one comes off well here, including Baumbach’s character, Walter, the eldest son. Walt is as facile as his father, spouting off about subjects he knows little about like giving one-sentence critiques of books he hasn’t read. Dad has rationalized his failure to publish with the bromide that true intellectual brilliance is never recognized by publishers or readers. He’s a nasty piece of work who has an unkind word for everyone. Walt, thinking himself brighter than he is, uses the same modus operandi to hide his shortcomings. Unfortunately, Walt is at the uncomfortable age where he needs to be recognized and loved—but mostly recognized—and he unerringly does the wrong thing every time.

It’s tougher to get a true handle on Mom. She sleeps around a lot and has the parenting skills of a gnat. Still, she loves her kids and is deeply hurt when Walt fingers her as the bad guy.

The depiction of pre-teen, Frank, is perhaps the most horrifying. He acts out to the divorce in extreme ways that nobody seems to notice. After all, Mom points out that lots of kids have divorced parents and they seem to deal with it. Frank starts sucking back beers and jerking off in public places like the school library where he spreads his cum over the books. Now there’s a true literary critic.

One wonders if Baumbach will ever be talking to his parents or brother again.

The cast is wonderful. Jesse Eisenberg as Walt strikes the right note of blithe self-assuredness inherent in 16-year olds. The scene where he defends plagiarizing the words of a Pink Floyd song is priceless. Owen Kline as Frank hangs in tough in a tough role. One might think it’s a lot to ask a young actor to perform acts in a film he’s not old enough to see in the theatre. He’s very creditable. Jeff Daniels as Bernard is such a pro. He can do anything, from schlock to high-end. Here he’s spot-on as a pathetic excuse for a human being. Laura Linney as Joan is also excellent, but she has less to work with than the others. Why she does anything she does is anybody’s guess.

Which is where most tranche de vie’s fail in the end, and Squid is no exception. It has a beginning but no end. (The last shot is rushed and wholly unsatisfying.) And while each event doesn’t have to be wrapped up in a neat bow, there’s so much of the story still to be told. It doesn’t appear anyone learned anything, but I don’t think Baumbach was trying to make a nihilistic statement.

Still, a film that helps us recognize things in ourselves we’d rather not is well worth the watch.  

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