For the
sake of not having to write the same intro a million
different ways throughout the rest of time, just know that
this column avoids the overly long and sometimes dull
process of full film reviews and instead opts to break
things down based on what I thought going in, what happened
while I was there and what I learned at the end of it all.
Thanks for reading!
The
Breakdown - 50/50
The Impression:
Jonathan Levine has put together a solid resume of films so
far: his youthful rap odyssey The Wackness and the
under seen and under appreciated horror film All The Boys
Love Mandy Lane are both solid films that invest tired
genres with emotion and humor. Neither film is an
out-of-the-park home run though, and that’s what I’m waiting
for from him, something that connects on all levels. Will
50/50 be that?
The Reality:
50/50 is what one might refer to as a film in a lower
key. The story of Will Reiser (here played by Joseph Gordon-Levitt
as Adam) and his battle with cancer doesn’t play on the big
moments one might expect from a film about the Big C.
Jonathan Levine chooses to focus instead on how the disease
effects Adam’s emotional output. We meet Adam as a
well-meaning sap, a good natured fellow who can’t see when
his friends are taking advantage of him. His girlfriend
Rachael (Bryce Dallas Howard in sharp, nasty form) is a
flighty two-faced artist. His best friend Kyle (Seth Rogan)
is a sex-crazed asshole who, though good-naturedly, pushes
Adam around. When Adam is surprisingly diagnosed with
cancer, the truth of who he is and who his friends are
quickly becomes apparent. The film rests on the lithe
shoulders of JGL and he performs with aplomb. Gordon-Levitt
never lets the alarming nature of his situation push him in
to extremes. He, and the entire movie, exist in a charming
limbo between the high peaks of earnest emotional output and
the simpler strains of a bromantic gross-out comedy.
50/50 doesn’t want to be a film about the tragic nature
of cancer. It doesn’t want to be Terms of Endearment.
It wants to be a film about the very intimate nature of
facing death and how it effects our friends and the core of
emotions thought to be so stable. With Levine at the helm
and Joseph Gordon Levitt continuing his slow progression in
to stardom, 50/50 succeeds gracefully.
The Lesson:
Jonathan Levine is still to work at a high level, but I
imagine he’ll get there.
- Noah Sanders
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