Login
Since this movie was directed by Noah Baumbach and starring George Clooney, I was quite eager to check it out. I actually loved ‘Marriage Story’ which was and still is my favorite movie released in 2019 but, somehow, I still haven’t watched ‘White Noise’ yet but, since it was a critical flop when it was released, I keep postponing watching the damned thing. Anyway, I actually liked this movie, above all thanks to Clooney who a perfect choice to play this character. Of course, there was an interesting meta aspect since he was playing a huge movie star and many complained that he didn’t even have to act here but that’s ridiculous. Even if his life might be similar to Kelly’s, he wasn’t playing himself. On top of that, it’s also something that was tackled in this movie, the fact that an actor, when they become a celebrity, actually always act a part when they are in public. I also did appreciate that, even though such huge stars are really wealthy, they are also terribly lonely and their lifestyle is so weird and so detached from the real world, it’s a wonder they can play regular folks at all. So, all this was pretty neat but, unfortunately, the whole thing was rather poorly written though. This movie was actually co-written by Emily Mortimer who also had a small role in this movie but I’m not surprised that it was her first gig as a writer. Concerning the flashbacks, I didn’t mind them but I wonder if the movie wouldn’t have worked better without these scenes as, they were rather random, in my opinion. A bigger issue was this road trip thing which annoyed me so much. Of course, during this trip, the main character met some colorful characters and learned about himself and life in general but it is such a lame lazy writing gimmick. Another issue was that there were just too many characters involved. I mean, the cast was impressive (George Clooney, Adam Sandler, Laura Dern, Billy Crudup, Emily Mortimer, Greta Gerwig, Riley Keough, Jim Broadbent, Patrick Wilson, Isla Fisher, Eve Hewson) but either they were given too little to do or they ended up in some rather half-baked sub-plots. The best example would be Adam Sandler’s character. Sandler was pretty good here, his character was actually so interesting that he almost hijacked the whole movie but he was also involved in a lame love triangle which was not only rather bewildering and, above all, completely unnecessary. Anyway, to conclude, even though it wasn’t a home-run for Baumbach, it was still a decent watch though, above all thanks to a fine George Clooney, and I think it is worth a look, especially if you like the genre.
7/10
