Cyrus

Cyrus had the incredible potential to be so much more than what it ended up being. With the absolutely fantastic cast that it has assembled and the premise that seemed like fertile ground for awkward and black comedy, Cyrus seemed destined to be an indie darling. Instead it winds up being another addition to the aggravating mumblecore movement. It does make one vast improvement over other mumblecore films: the characters feel like real people and not annoyingly damaged overbearingly quirky movie characters. Look, I’ve known my fair share of Greenberg’s and Margot’s, but these characters and films are so poorly written that it makes me want to inflict self-harm to make it all go away.

Cyrus teeters towards the edge of that precipice, but never fully falls into it. I place that saving grace squarely on the shoulders of the cast. A collection of Academy Award nominees (one of whom is a winner) and John Hill, in a performance of surprisingly intense and disturbed sociopathic tendencies that it makes you wonder if he was just slumming it in Superbad and Knocked Up. When presented with the vaguest of character outlines, the cast makes them feel real by improving and trying their best to make these people feel lived in and complicated.

For that reason alone Marisa Tomei deserves another award of some kind. When presented with what amounts to a stick figure, Tomei forges ahead and creates a portrait of a woman who has no one but her son. She is not dumb, but impossibly naïve about her son. Perhaps she has been fed too much fast-food self-help, you know the kind – it became the de jour thing in the 90s and hasn’t quite gone away since. One too many self-help books might do something like this to you. Look at Rielle Hunter. She can talk about her feelings and emotions with the broadest of therapeutic words, but can’t see that her son has intentionally damaged or destroyed every relationship (or possible relationship) she has ever had. Catherine Keener gives a great turn in a small supporting role as John C. Reilly’s ex-wife who wants him to get on with his life since their divorce was seven years ago. She seems almost too smart for him in many ways, and it’s a testament to her character that she was able to put up with him for that long and still remain good friends.

And John C. Reilly, surely, easily, one of my favorite actors currently working, has officially won back all of my love and admiration after detouring into cringe-inducing comedies well below his talents. He can portray hapless and slightly dumbfounded better than anyone. It’s a solid performance, nothing that he hasn’t done a variation of, or bettered in previous work. But it’s nice to seem him playing a character and not a schtick again.

Cyrus is fairly routine. It came armed with a trailer that screamed hilariously twisted comedy and delivered all of the funny in the trailer. Everything else is painfully awkward, predictable but very well-acted. This cast deserved so much better. I’m still waiting to be impressed by this mumblecore movement.