Labor Day Review
Writer, producer and director Jason Reitman has told
some incredible stories through his camera lens over the years. From “Thank You
For Smoking” to “Up In The Air,” to “Young Adult,” he is able to conjure
gracious, adult, comedic timing. He is also able to create genuine stories
about adulthood. Sometimes, he’s just got a great story to cook up and he’s
able to put real life into it. His latest film “Labor Day” was based off a book
by Joyce Maynard. I am a little tempted to track down and read the book.
Apparently, it has been a passion project for Reitman to get Maynard’s book on
the big screen, and after viewing the final product, I really wonder what he
saw in the story at all.
In 2007, Jason Reitman made “Juno” and I bet I am
going to shock many of you when I say that it terrible and overrated and I did
not enjoy a single moment of it. We will set aside Diablo Cody’s equally
overrated, hipster, stupid script aside because that is a conversation for a
different time and place. My biggest gripe with “Juno” was that Reitman
glorified teenage pregnancy, by making a movie which nearly encouraged it. “Juno”
is a movie that tells us that teenage pregnancy is a breeze and that your
parents will support you and your boyfriend will turn into a knight in shining
armor and your life won’t be put on hold at all. If you don’t want your baby, it’s
okay, a miracle family will be right around the corner to take it for you. If
we look at the real world, that’s not entirely true. If you are going to be a
teen mom, you need to be responsible and you need to get your head on straight,
otherwise things will never be sugarplums and rainbows. But Reitman just wanted
to convey his fantasy message, knowing that “Juno” would mostly appeal to
teenage girls. I bring up “Juno” only because “Labor Day” seems equally
wrongheaded with its philosophy and message.
“Labor Day” takes place in 1987 in New Hampshire. We
meet Henry (Gattlin Griffith) who lives with his mom Adele (Kate Winslett). We
learn from voice-overs by adult Henry (done by Tobey McGuire), that Henry’s
father (Clark Gregg) left them and that Adele sank into severe depression immediately
afterward. Thus, sparking an over-protective, slightly creepy relationship
between mother and son. One day, while at the grocery store, Henry comes across
a man named Frank (Josh Brolin), who says he needs his help. It quickly becomes
apparent that Frank is in trouble and he forces Adele and Henry to take him to
their home. He ties up Adele and tells them he needs to lie low for the night
and that he’ll get on a train later. It is revealed that Frank is a criminal
who escaped prison, but Frank assures the family that there is more to his
story than the media will deliver.
This all happens the Thursday before Labor Day weekend,
so no train comes by the home. So Frank seems to have no other choice but stick
with Adele and Henry. Frank then turns into the type of man every woman dreams
of encountering. Frank fixes all the problems in Adele's house, he teaches Henry how to throw a baseball, he makes pie, its all a perfect fantasy. Also,
Henry begins to warm up to Frank and really begins to look up to him as if he
is a father figure and Adele and Frank are in love by Saturday evening.
I’d describe the film’s preposterous ending to you,
but that might be the final nail in the coffin for most of you. Just as “Juno”
glorified and campaigned for teenage pregnancy, “Labor Day” pretty much says
that if you have severely depressed parent, just hook them up with the first
charismatic jail breaker you can find, then they will live happily ever after. This is the biggest “soap-opera-turned-movie”
to come out in awhile. It features a premise so phony that I could hardly
believe the idea was greenlit by a studio, let alone published for a book.
Well, let me back up, that is unfair to say. It could be true that the novel
works better than Reitman’s film. Perhaps Reitman did not understand what he
was trying to translate to screen, and so what is left is a boggled mess.
Logic and narrative flaws aside, I could not really
tell the type of story Reitman was trying to tell. At one glance, this seems
like a coming-of-age story for Henry, and then there is a great deal of
emphasis made on memory. There is a big theory going around that Henry and
Adele made Frank up, and that he was a figment of their imaginations. But the
way the film ends, I am not sure I believe that. What is for sure is that this
film is structured very poorly. Reitman has so many styles he wants to put on
the screen, but none of them fit the story he is trying to tell. So he gets his
already jumbled story to look as if it was shot by giraffes.
If “Labor Day” works for you, it will lie heavily on
Brolin and Winslett. They work overtime to make real humans out of the
characters they play. Their chemistry is phenomenal and if they were given a
vibrant love story to play, they’d do incredibly well. I also got to hand to
Griffith for making a likable, confused, curious youngster come to life
onscreen. His performance is the glue to the entire storyline and he sells it
hard. There are many good performances in the movie, which nearly make you buy
into the hoopla of a story “Labor Day” tries to tell. But the story is so
backwards and silly that I had no trouble seeing right through it.
“Labor Day” makes good work of its actors, and its
technical merits are certainly impressive, but that is where the praise ends.
Underneath all the good, there is a soulless story, painted so broad that I
find it hard to care. I know Reitman is capable of astounding work, but
sometimes his strange messages get the best of him. Such is the case with “Labor
Day.”
FINAL GRADE: D
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