A SIMPLE FAVOR (2018), MADAME CURIE (1943)
Second week of September and that back-to-school feeling and the crisp Maine day had me back to my favorite schedule. Work. Movie. Work. Dinner and fun. Sleep. It was a day of polishing pages, doing the hard-core, long-hand revisions on the printed page. Amazing how many flaws jump out at me once I see them off the computer screen. Typos, syntax problems, missed words. Missed thoughts or thoughts that made so much sense as they danced off my fingertips at the keyboard but now on the cold truth of a sheet of 8x11 paper, were miserably unclear. I stated work at 5 am. The movie I wanted to see started at 1:15 pm. I figured it would be the perfect time to take a break.
I am still in my “women protagonist” week at the movies.
Here goes:
A Simple Favor (2018) Blake Lively and Anna Kendrick
THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 2018: A Simple Favor (Wr: Jessica Sharzer, based on a Darcey Bell novel; Dir: Paul Feig) I was intrigued by the marketed genre combination: crime/comedy/drama/mystery/thriller. Being somewhat of a genre freak (my book Film Genre for the Screenwriter (2015) is all about viable combinations of story genres and the joy a writer can get out of bringing a sense of “newness” to a story and characters by craftily fulfilling genre elements. And I wanted to be totally on board with this film – two female leads – and a lot of cool genres. The first thirty minutes I was thrilled. Snappy comedic dialogue bantered by two fabulous actresses, two very distinct characters (Stephanie, a nerdy, stay-at-home-mom vlogger (Anna Kendrick) and Emily (Blake Lively) a remote, gorgeous, abrasive and condescending working-mom) who become unlikely new friends. And then the mystery/thriller twist at the requisite end of Act One (20-30 minutes into the movie). My mind was hooked. But gradually, the hook fell out of my greedy-for-good-story psyche and I was looking at the time on my phone and I began to wonder why. Was it because nerdy Stephanie’s backstory seemed out of character and unbelievable? Was it because Emily’s husband was created as a bland pawn, there to complicate the plot but acting in unbelievable ways? Because everything was explained just to make the plot work? Was it because the numerous twists and turns seemed to want to outdo Gone Girl? Was it because it was no longer a story driven by characters but a story driven by plot twists where characters were no longer true to their cores? I truly believe that – as Aristotle, McKee, Truby, Vogler, Sorkin, Goldman, Seger and more (names all screenwriters should know) that character is story and story is character. Once the protagonist or antagonist or important supporting character acts in a way that seems out of sync with their core, the chances of the audience falling out increase. Or could it be that the chosen genre elements were not able to combine in a successful fashion? Can we look at other dram-edy/crime/thrillers and examine that question? What about the classic Charade (1963)? Cary Grant’s character and Audrey Hepburn’s character are quirky, there’s quick, humorous dialogue, there’s intrigue, thriller elements - and romance, action and adventure are also woven in. That’s six genres, all meticulously satisfactorily exploited while the characters stayed true to the cores. Consider In Bruges (2008), two very different characters with comedic bent and adversarial goals and the twists in the thriller tale surprise – but at the same time make sense. Baby Driver (2017) had humor, but was not really set up as a comedy. The Fletch films (1980s), starring Chevy Chase, are centered on a comedic character. There is crime and mystery, but the thriller genre is missing. (The classic thriller element (puzzle after puzzle that needs to be figured out for survival and to take down the bad guy)). Maybe Mr. and Mrs. Smith (2005), definitely not one of my favorite movies, gets a bit closer to the comedy/drama/crime/mystery/thriller combination (throw in some romance).
Two-thirds of the way through A Simple Favor, I began to time the “twists” and they rolled over each other so fast that the fun of helping the protagonist figure out “the puzzle” was gone, because now the protagonist was creating the puzzle and changing the pieces willy-nilly. But I wanted to see how far off I was in my assessment, so I hung out in the ladies’ room for a bit and chatted up some viewers, then moved out to the hallway to chat up those looking through the theater’s window wondering if rain was coming, then ingratiated myself with a couple heading out to their car in the parking lot. “Whatdya think?” I asked. The reply I got back, over and over, in my very polite, but friendly community was this: “Oh. I guess it was fun.” Anna Kendrick’s hometown is Portland, Maine. I know everyone’s rooting for her. I’m rooting for female-driven film stories. Wish this one had lived up to its Act One promise. (Estimated budget @ $20 million. Opening weekend US box office @ $16 million. )
Greer Garson and Walter Pidgeon in Madame Curie (1943)
SEPTEMBER 15:
Because I’m working on a historical fiction book right now, a biography of a female scientist in the 18th century (should be out probably summer 2019 if I can crack it!), I settled into my couch with my remote and searched for bio-pics that might relate. I’d been working on the novel for six hours and I needed a break – but wanted to still feel “work-productive”; right – any excuse to watch a movie. MADAME CURIE (1943; Wrs: Paul Osborn, Hans Rameau, based on a book by Marie Curie’s daughter, Eve. Dir: Mervyn LeRoy). Greer Garson and Walter Pidgeon won top acting accolades from the Academy Awards for their performances of the Curies, it won the Outstanding Motion Picture Award and awards for cinematography, sound and set design. It is a great movie, beautifully presented in black and white. Surely, the film story, if done today, would be approached differently. The Polish Marie Slodowska and her family were caught in the midst of many political conflicts in Poland, they lost most of their money but Marie found ways to get educated; her intellect and aptitude for science caught attention. But not enough for a richer family to allow their son to marry this girl he loved, for she was from a lower class. She was broken-hearted in Warsaw and accepted an invitation to study at the University of Paris. She worked to save money and then travelled from her homeland to France and was the only female in science at the University of Paris.
Imagine the scenes to be written already!
The 1943 movie does not touch on her background, it begins on a beauty shot of the stunning Greer Garson, in a University classroom, surrounded by men. She is weak from hunger and faints. Her kindly professor gives her tea, buys her dinner and arranges to introduce her to Pierre Curie, a respected scientist with a laboratory where she work to help make ends meet. Pierre is, at all times, understanding, respectful and helpful. When Marie graduates from University and plans to go home to Poland, he realizes he is in love with her and asks her to marry him and stay. She does and they work together on radioactivity, earning a Nobel Prize in 1903. Somewhere in these years of painstaking work, they had two children. Pierre comes to an untimely end the night of the Nobel ceremony and although Marie is devastated, she continues on and wins a second Nobel prize in chemistry in 1911. Fade to black.
The script is gentle, kind, even funny at times when Pierre realizes how much he loves Marie. There is no nod to sexism, or the obstacles of being a talented woman in a man’s world, of growing international turmoil – or that Marie Curie’s work in radioactivity weakened her immeasurably and eventually was one of the causes of her death. Bio-pics of this era seldom dealt with the underbelly of personalities, bigotry, discrimination or controversial consequences. The 1940 movie Edison, The Man (starring Spencer Tracy) never illuminated the man greedy for patents and glory. Brigham Young (1940, starring Tyrone Power) set the story of a man who traveled to Utah to lead the Church of Latter Day Saints and eventually become governor of Utah. The controversies – such as his stand on polygamy, or belief that Adam and Eve came from “another planet”, his racist doctrines, and his participation in the Mountain Meadow Massacre – are not part of the film story. Madame Curie (1943) is uplifting; Marie is made out to be a saint. That is not the way of contemporary bio-pics. The Social Network (2010, script by Aaron Sorkin) presents the life of the creator of Facebook (yes, through the lens of Sorkin) with all its pimples, scars and meanness. Aviator (2004, script by John Logan) reveals Howard Hughes’ complexities, manias and problems – as well as his incredible energy and talent. Similar explorations were taken on in Walk the Line (2005) and Malcolm X (1992) and other bio-pics. Perhaps the softer, (would we call them more old-fashioned?) The King’s Speech (2010) and The Imitation Game (2014) could have delved deeper, but - the world was part of the story.
The world - its dirt, politics (human and national) are not included in the 1943 film on the life of Marie Curie. At its heart, it is a romance, and it touches the heart. The message is about hard work, hope and steadfastness. It is a lovely way to spend a few hours. But, with a cynical mind nurtured by the world today, left me wanting a more contemporary “attack” on the story.