"Love the Coopers" Review

Readers, if I may be frank with you all for a moment, there are days when I hate doing this. This schtick of not choosing my review until I get to the theater, often leaving it up to a coin flip, has landed me in some pretty deep dung - The Gallows, Max, etc. My reactions result in anything from disillusionment to violent, vocal hatred, and while the review serves as a way to purge myself (that's another franchise with a tendency to boil my blood), the initial experience remains a test of patience. 

So during Love the Coopers, if you were to walk in, you'd find me in the far back corner, hoodie up, fist under cheek, contorted in a manner that grasps at straws to be comfortable. I'd convince myself that twenty minutes had to have passed by now. I check my phone, and it's only been eight. I do this three times. And as I continue to watch talented people portray miserable, unfunny characters, I feel like a schoolkid, coiled up and waiting for the bell. What runs through my mind? "Just remember all the good the purge does."

Love the Coopers follows the members of the Cooper family on the days leading up to their big Christmas dinner. The reunion's at Charlotte (Diane Keaton) and Sam's (John Goodman) house; they're falling out of love forty years into their marriage. They have two kids. Eleanor (Olivia Wilde), a failed playwright hiding her sadness behind sarcasm and a martini, and Hank (Ed Helms), a recently unemployed divorcee trying to get a job in time to pay for his kids' Christmas presents. Who are his kids? There's Charlie (Timothée Chalamet), an awkward teen crushing on a girl; Bo (Maxwell Simkins), a goodhearted kid searching for the perfect present to remedy his and Charlie's friendship, damaged after the divorce; and Madison (Blake Baumgartner), a slightly potty-mouthed version of Michelle from Full House. Also arriving at the dinner table are Charlotte's jealous kleptomaniac sister, Emma (Marisa Tomei); Charlotte and Emma's lonely father Bucky (Alan Arkin) and his lover or maybe just a good friend, Ruby (Amanda Seyfried); and Sam's memory-loss-stricken Aunt Fishy (June Squibb).

...did you get all that?

Let's not kid ourselves - I don't expect Shakespearean development from a Brady Bunch-sized ensemble cast. And it's not like we need that to make a good film, case in point, Love Actually. Love Actually also featured simple characters with problems of their own, but they were written in a manner that allowed us to empathize and sympathize with their choices. They charmed us, warmed our hearts, resembled us in our bright and dark moments. So when in Love the Coopers, Eleanor denigrates a soldier (Jake Lacy, one of the film's few highlights) for his Republican and Christian beliefs for no reason, or Sam whines about a trip to Africa he was going to take with Charlotte before they had kids, citing this as a solution to save for their crumbling marriage, it confuses me. These characters don't resemble us, they're caricatures - hollow, tiresome caricatures.

Jake Lacy possibly inspecting a sudden growth on Olivia Wilde's face.

And that's not to say these characters are invalid or boring because they're jerks. In recent memory, Aaron Sorkin's script for Steve Jobs surprised me by making the man out to seem even more of a douchebag than in Jobs featuring Ashton Kutcher. However, Sorkin writes with eloquence. I understand why his Steve Jobs thinks and acts the way he does, and even though I think the character's a jerk, the script provides a comprehensive and unique spin on the archetype. It can be done with a skillful script, something Love the Coopers sorely needs.

The film's directed by Jessie Nelson (Corrina, Corrina) and her direction seems confused. Some scenes, especially near the beginning, are shot almost like a documentary or news footage as the film shows montages of Christmas images, in reference to the holiday's spirit and commercialism. This is juxtaposed with moments of random CGI - most odd being Olivia Wilde's spontaneous glassy combustion (Just had a moment of sobriety - that sentence is a strange one). Conversations are often choppy - one character is shown, then the other, back and forth with such little variety that I can't help but wonder if the actors are even in the same room.

As Love the Coopers nears its ending, I've already checked out. The last half hour is predictable, save for a disappointing resolution with Bucky and Ruby's subplot, and (mercifully) rushes by so fast, I don't have time to let it sink in before the credits roll. As soon as the credits scrolled up, I was out of my seat and gone. Though you shouldn't try to beat my land speed record, this movie's not worth your time.

Thank you all for reading; I'm the Man Without a Plan, signing off.