It's impossible to deny the influence Greta Gerwig has had on Noah
Baumbach since she became the apple of his cinematic (and romantic) eye with
2012's Frances Ha. No
longer content to dwell on comically self-loathing characters, Baumbach has
found a new comedic zeal with Gerwig as his co-writer and muse. Their latest
collaboration, Mistress
America, is an old-style screwball comedy that continues Baumbach's
emotional upswing and Gerwig's gusto for playing larger-than-life characters.
A little like Frances Ha's frantic sibling,
Mistress America explores, in arguably Baumbach's funniest screenplay yet, the
strength of female friendships against the need to assert one's individuality.
Stealing the show from scene one is the terrific Lola Kirke as Tracy, a
plain-Jane 18-year-old struggling to adjust to college life in Manhattan. An
aspiring writer whose talent is perhaps marginal at best, Tracy doesn't fit in
with her more-gifted peers and is too socially awkward to totally click with
those she has most in common with. She's able to attract the friendship of
awkward classmate Tony (the hilarious Matthew Shear), but can't hold his
attention for long. With loneliness setting in she reluctantly dials up her
future sister-in-law Brooke (Gerwig), who she's never met, and suddenly her
world increases a thousand-fold.
Brooke turns out to be an absolute force of
nature sweeping through Manhattan like a hurricane. She scoops up Tracy's dull
life, as well, engulfing her in firestorm of opinions and ideas, introducing
her to colorful new people who are all just as successful as Brooke is. She has
apparently done everything, met everyone, and been everywhere (in New York,
anyway). Brooke offers up so much information at a rapid-fire clip that she
quickly becomes a walking legend; it's impossible to figure out what's real and
what's made up out of whole cloth. For Tracy it doesn't really matter; Brooke
is giving her the exciting city life she always hoped for, and it gets her
creative juices flowing.
All it takes is one wild night out on the
town to get Tracy writing again, with Brooke's life serving as the springboard
to her newest venture. Tracy is just happy to be by her side, whether it be as
a friend, little sister-to-be, or as personal assistant. Brooke becomes
something of an unofficial mentor with Tracy as her young padewan. But things
aren't all great, and soon the bloom starts to come off Brooke's rose when
failures begin to mount. She's getting older and the carefree lifestyle that
has served her so well can't last forever. And in the midst of those failures,
Brooke's narcissism begins to peek out, leading to an inevitable rift between
the two women.
Taking a little bit of time to get moving,
the film picks up steam from the moment Gerwig makes her memorable Times Square
entrance. And what a role it turns out to be for her. Brooke is the kind of
outsized character we'd expect someone like Bette Midler to devour with glee,
and Gerwig proves to be more than a match for it. Her innate vitality
proves to be a perfect fit for the film's blistering pace, with character
zipping non-sequiturs and one-liners past one another at a remarkable clip.
Inspired by the screwball comedies of
Howard Hawkes, Ernst Lubich, and Peter Bogdanovich, along with a touch of John
Hughes, Mistress America is a delightful yet poignant farce
that makes the utmost use of its talented director and stars. It's best
exemplified in an incredibly well-staged scene in which all of the film's
characters are assembled in a single location where every subplot, big and
small, can get bounced around. It may be the best scene Baumbach has ever directed
juggling so much all at once, but he gets a lot of help from his cast, many of
whom are theater veterans used to the staged madness. Kirke, who some may
recognize from David Fincher's Gone
Girl, gives a deceptively intense performance that only grows in stature.
And at the center of it is Gerwig, who literally runs through the entire
gamut of emotions during this incredible sequence, and somehow finds a way to
make all of them meaningful. If there's an issue it's the downbeat, maudlin
conclusion that wraps up neater than the rest of the film would have us believe
is possible.
While the jokes come a mile a minute,
there are more serious issues always lurking beneath the surface. Similar to
Baumbach's terrific coming-of-middle age dramedy While We're Young, the
mentor/student relationship is looked upon as a potentially thorny dynamic
destined for betrayal. Most prominent is the bond formed between two women just
trying to find their way. That there isn't some kind of forced male/female
romance says a lot for the type of movies Gerwig and Baumbach are trying to
make. Strip away all of the jokes, catchy quotes (of which there are tons), and
the madcap frenzy and what you've got is an incredible honest and engaging
story with two deeply-layered female characters. Those don't come around nearly
enough, but hopefully Mistress
America can be the start of a
great trend.
Rating: 3.5 out of 5
