#100 - Wendy and Lucy / The Player

Alert: This review contains spoilers, sorry - can't make my point without it. Just go rent Wendy & Lucy (definitely) and then The Player (if you like movie industry satire w/ lots of in jokes - I did) and skip the rest.

Two Netflix movies for short review that have an interesting connection. First is The Player - a Robert Altman directed film from 1992 starring Tim Robbins as studio exec Griffin Mills. It is a well-done satire about the movie industry, full of inside jokes and cameos. So full of cameos that a couple times I mistakenly thought someone was playing themselves when in fact they were playing a character. It also has a very good film noir undertone so I have to recommend it.

The main thrust of the Hollywood satire is about how filmmakers compromise their artistic vision. A movie vision starts out defined as "No stars, real life, no happy ending", but ends with a movie featuring big stars, corny dialogue, and an off-into-the-sunset ending.

Which brings me to Wendy and Lucy which is a movie that would never get made under the Griffin Mills system. Michelle Williams portrays a financially strained woman on a cross-country trek who experiences various tragedies. As most reviewers put it, it is a story about living right on the edge of the economic abyss. The movie begins really in the middle of Wendy's story - we don't know what she is running from or what happened before she arrives in the Oregon town where her car breaks down and her dog Lucy is lost. And the end of the movie is not a resolution of anything at all. Indeed the ending totally surprised me, and in one sense I felt cheated but as I thought later - it worked. Life is messy and nothing ever really gets wrapped up.

And it is a movie that sticks with you. My estimation of the movie has gone up since I watched it. For example and here is the spoiler for those not heeding my earlier warning - in the middle of the film - having no alternatives -Wendy sleeps out in the woods and is discovered by another homeless person. While ultimately this man does nothing more than frighten Wendy, this scene resonated for me because a) Michelle Williams does a fine job of conveying terror, anxiety, and then cathartic relief and b) I realized later that given Wendy's financial predicament being raped in the woods would be less terrible than being robbed. And that realization sent such a shiver down my spine that my sympathy for the character increased immeasurably.

So, here's to all the movies that get made in spite of the Griffin Mills of the world. Thank you for the ambiguity, for the non-happy endings, for making me think. It might hurt - but it is an ice-cream headache - I'll forget about it and want more later.