☆☆½
The family has been gone for a swim meet, and as they let the dogs out of the car and unpack the groceries they notice something is wrong. A pot outside has been broken. There is some movement through the windows. One of the kids, who isn't more than 5 years old, says, "I saw Nic." And just like that, the day becomes yet again about Nic, just as it has been for years.
The Sheff family has not had a day's peace since Nic (Timothée Chalamet) revealed himself as a drug addict and began seeking treatment. In his effort to save his beautiful boy, Nic's father Dave (Steve Carell) has become addicted himself, addicted to the process of finding, rescuing and paying attention to his son.
This is ultimately the point of Dave Sheff's searing memoir, Beautiful Boy: A Father's Journey Through His Son's Addiction, which chronicles the emotional toll that Nic's addiction to crystal meth (not to mention pot, alcohol, heroin, LSD and just about anything else you can inhale, swallow or inject) takes on the man who helped create the boy.
The movie version of Beautiful Boy is not based just on Dave Sheff's memoir, which I have read, but also on Nic Sheff's own memoir, Tweaked, which I haven't, and it is this ambitious film's unfortunate weakness that it tries to see the experience from both perspectives. Admirable though that may be, but leads to dramatic disappointment.
As it shifts back and forth from Dave's experience to Nic's, Beautiful Boy can't find a completely compelling narrative for either of them. This is a film that means well, and that is carefully, lovingly made and even more carefully acted, but such caution feels safe. Narratively, it jumps back and forth in time, showing Nic at different ages and providing a gently glowing look back at what seems like an idyllic childhood in an expensive home in the middle of the rolling countryside of Marin County, the place where liberal rich people can go to be pretentious in private. The Sheff house is all wood and glass and rambling luxury, and what would have been really interesting is to see how this kind of millionaire's lifestyle, combined with the anger of divorce, affected Nic as a child.
Carell plays Dave as a passively sweet nice guy with a weird edge, laced with real temper and obsessive behavior, and there are tantalizing hints that he could have been a lot more than a 21st century Ward Cleaver. All around the edges of Beautiful Boy are indications of what the movie could have been, but director Felix van Groeningen and his co-screenwriter Luke Davies keep leaning in the direction of the old disease-of-the-week TV movies, where a famous face earned an Emmy nomination by playing someone whose seemingly perfect life goes off the rails and viewers are treated to end title cards underscoring the importance of supporting efforts to battle the illness.
And, indeed, that's exactly what the ending of Beautiful Boy provides, and throughout the movie brings in extraneous characters like a doctor played by Timothy Hutton explain a few important facts about the abuse of crystal meth, to drop facts and statistics that are meant to enhance the drama but instead bring it to a screeching halt.
So many luminous, golden moments of a perfect childhood are contrasted with the complex, roiling, raging person Nic has grown into, but there's no insight into why Nic's bucolic upbringing led him to become someone with such a deep, black hole of despair at his core. Chalamet seems to have tried hard to understand it, and even though he spends most of the film looking and behaving with far too clean-cut a smile and swagger, he does find someone real in Nic, someone identifiable -- if only the filmmakers didn't keep cutting away from his story just when it was getting interesting.
Back and forth, back and forth, Beautiful Boy swings between past and present, between son and father, between addiction and obsession, never settling down long enough to let us feel fully connected to either one. It's not until about 90 minutes in that Beautiful Boy finally achieves something of the raw power it has been hoping to convey, as Nic comes back to the family home while everyone else is away. A strung-out girlfriend in tow, Nic is looking for things to steal, for anything he can sell for some money to get a quick fix. It's the latest of many relapses for him, and Chalamet plays him with little remorse or pity. Then, just as he's about to flee with a few items in hand, the family comes back.
No one is sure what to do. Dave is disappointed after so many attempts to help his son, but stepmom Karen (Maura Tierney) is filled with an anger she hasn't yet shown. As Nic and his girlfriend drive off, Karen gets into the family minivan and drives after him, and a staggering range of emotions runs across her face as she pursues a boy she thought she knew, but who is too far gone to reach.
It's a scene filled with tension and devoid of dialogue; it's the first time Beautiful Boy presents emotions that really ring true, and it's a shame it has taken the film so long to find its center. It's also one of the rare moments in which Beautiful Boy doesn't try to explain to us what Nic or Dave is feeling or thinking. The film would have benefitted more from raw and painful moments like this one, instead of the fact-laden, earnest and well-intentioned but frankly dull approach it too often takes.
Viewed October 27, 2018 -- ArcLight Hollywood
1745
The Sheff family has not had a day's peace since Nic (Timothée Chalamet) revealed himself as a drug addict and began seeking treatment. In his effort to save his beautiful boy, Nic's father Dave (Steve Carell) has become addicted himself, addicted to the process of finding, rescuing and paying attention to his son.
This is ultimately the point of Dave Sheff's searing memoir, Beautiful Boy: A Father's Journey Through His Son's Addiction, which chronicles the emotional toll that Nic's addiction to crystal meth (not to mention pot, alcohol, heroin, LSD and just about anything else you can inhale, swallow or inject) takes on the man who helped create the boy.
The movie version of Beautiful Boy is not based just on Dave Sheff's memoir, which I have read, but also on Nic Sheff's own memoir, Tweaked, which I haven't, and it is this ambitious film's unfortunate weakness that it tries to see the experience from both perspectives. Admirable though that may be, but leads to dramatic disappointment.
As it shifts back and forth from Dave's experience to Nic's, Beautiful Boy can't find a completely compelling narrative for either of them. This is a film that means well, and that is carefully, lovingly made and even more carefully acted, but such caution feels safe. Narratively, it jumps back and forth in time, showing Nic at different ages and providing a gently glowing look back at what seems like an idyllic childhood in an expensive home in the middle of the rolling countryside of Marin County, the place where liberal rich people can go to be pretentious in private. The Sheff house is all wood and glass and rambling luxury, and what would have been really interesting is to see how this kind of millionaire's lifestyle, combined with the anger of divorce, affected Nic as a child.
Carell plays Dave as a passively sweet nice guy with a weird edge, laced with real temper and obsessive behavior, and there are tantalizing hints that he could have been a lot more than a 21st century Ward Cleaver. All around the edges of Beautiful Boy are indications of what the movie could have been, but director Felix van Groeningen and his co-screenwriter Luke Davies keep leaning in the direction of the old disease-of-the-week TV movies, where a famous face earned an Emmy nomination by playing someone whose seemingly perfect life goes off the rails and viewers are treated to end title cards underscoring the importance of supporting efforts to battle the illness.
And, indeed, that's exactly what the ending of Beautiful Boy provides, and throughout the movie brings in extraneous characters like a doctor played by Timothy Hutton explain a few important facts about the abuse of crystal meth, to drop facts and statistics that are meant to enhance the drama but instead bring it to a screeching halt.
So many luminous, golden moments of a perfect childhood are contrasted with the complex, roiling, raging person Nic has grown into, but there's no insight into why Nic's bucolic upbringing led him to become someone with such a deep, black hole of despair at his core. Chalamet seems to have tried hard to understand it, and even though he spends most of the film looking and behaving with far too clean-cut a smile and swagger, he does find someone real in Nic, someone identifiable -- if only the filmmakers didn't keep cutting away from his story just when it was getting interesting.
Back and forth, back and forth, Beautiful Boy swings between past and present, between son and father, between addiction and obsession, never settling down long enough to let us feel fully connected to either one. It's not until about 90 minutes in that Beautiful Boy finally achieves something of the raw power it has been hoping to convey, as Nic comes back to the family home while everyone else is away. A strung-out girlfriend in tow, Nic is looking for things to steal, for anything he can sell for some money to get a quick fix. It's the latest of many relapses for him, and Chalamet plays him with little remorse or pity. Then, just as he's about to flee with a few items in hand, the family comes back.
No one is sure what to do. Dave is disappointed after so many attempts to help his son, but stepmom Karen (Maura Tierney) is filled with an anger she hasn't yet shown. As Nic and his girlfriend drive off, Karen gets into the family minivan and drives after him, and a staggering range of emotions runs across her face as she pursues a boy she thought she knew, but who is too far gone to reach.
It's a scene filled with tension and devoid of dialogue; it's the first time Beautiful Boy presents emotions that really ring true, and it's a shame it has taken the film so long to find its center. It's also one of the rare moments in which Beautiful Boy doesn't try to explain to us what Nic or Dave is feeling or thinking. The film would have benefitted more from raw and painful moments like this one, instead of the fact-laden, earnest and well-intentioned but frankly dull approach it too often takes.
Viewed October 27, 2018 -- ArcLight Hollywood
1745
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