Human agony, both physical and emotional, is Darren Aronofsky’s foundation, but FormatBuoyed by Brendan Fraser’s unimpressive performance as a self-eating 600-pound master, he takes the subject to extremes and remains firmly within the confines of naturalism. Adapted from Samuel D. Hunter’s play, the intense chamber drama never hides its scenic roots, but transcends them with grace and compassion, with layers of pain and despair, love and weary hope, pushed back into the central work. Frasier forces us to see the deeply moving heart of this broken man behind the alarming exterior.
The play premiered in New York in 2012, and since then Hunter has received a MacArthur Grant (aka “Genius” Grant) and has served as a writer and producer on the beloved FX comedy-drama series. baskets. He has created a body of stage work, primarily set in his home state of Idaho, where themes of queer identity, spirituality, loneliness, existential sadness, and the collective loss of distant communities are explored with penetrating empathy and deft skill. of repression. . feeling. His mastery of covering everyday life has made him one of the most valuable voices to emerge in American drama in the last decade.
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There will be tears.
With its isolated airless setting and a protagonist whose serious health crisis makes his life moment clear from the start, Format Screencasting seemed like a dangerous prospect. Aronofsky achieves this not by artificially opening the play, but by leaning into its theatricality, plunging us into the claustrophobia that has become inevitable for Fraser’s character Charlie. The main character’s scene structure is limited to a few rooms while the secondary characters come and go, sometimes overlapping, it’s still like a game.
Shooting at a comfortable 1.33 aspect ratio might have been even more jarring, and the lack of light coming from outside Charlie’s apartment is perhaps symbolically cumbersome. But cinematographer Matthew Libatique’s agile camera and Andrew Weissblum’s dynamic editing bring surprising movement to a static situation. An important and questionable choice is to extol Rob Simonsen’s emotionally charged score rather than relying on the cast to get the job done.
Aronofsky and Hunter surprise audiences from the start, not only revealing Charlie’s severe obesity (Fraser wears extensive digital prosthetics designed by Adrien Morot), but also showing this mountain of sexual desire in a man. Charlie disables his camera during the online writing course he is teaching, claiming that his laptop’s webcam is broken. But his video component works perfectly when a few minutes later he watches gay porn and masturbates furiously.
Thomas (Ty Simpkins), a seemingly out-of-this-world young missionary from New Life Church, knocks on his door and preaches the acceptance of Christ as the end-time portal to a better world. The clumsy intrusion leaves Charlie breathless. Convinced she is dying, an event she seems to have been rehearsing for months, she begs a panicked Thomas to read a student essay on Melville. dick mobyWhich brings you comfort for reasons that will become clear later.
Charlie’s crisis is averted with the arrival of her friend Liz (Hon Chow, wonderful), a health worker used to dealing with her emergencies. He tells her that congestive heart failure and high blood pressure mean she will likely die within a week. Annoyed by her constant refusal to go to the hospital, allegedly due to lack of health insurance, Liz is often shown to be impatient and irritated with Charlie. But her love for him is such that she reluctantly gives in to fast food addiction, bringing him buckets of fried chicken and cold cuts.
Grief is the illness that unites Charlie and the cunning Lisa, and it also forces him to be angry with Thomas. His adoptive father is a senior member of New Life’s board of directors and blames the church for the death of his brother Alan. Alan was Charlie’s former student who became the love of his life, but he never got over his father’s conviction and developed a chronic eating disorder that eventually killed him.
The sheer symmetry of one partner starving and the other self-destructing out of hate is a bit schematic, as is dick moby The elements are literary flourishes that show the writer’s hand. But Hunter’s script and the intimacy of the cast’s work keep the melancholy drama steady and believable.
In addition to his heartbreak over his involvement in Alan’s death, Charlie is plagued with guilt over abandoning his daughter Ellie (Sadie Sink) ten years ago, aged 8, when he left his wife Mary (Samantha Morton) for Alan. Mary won full custody and prevented Charlie from seeing her daughter, but he has contacted her and wants to meet her any time. Eli is a rabid misanthrope in danger of dropping out of high school, and his animosity towards his father manifests as contempt and cruelty. But when he buys her time and offers to help her with rehearsals and promises to leave her all the money he has, Ellie returns.
The teenager’s harsh confrontation with his father’s gentle giant is matched by his relationship with Thomas, whom he manipulates in the same way Charlie and his tough mother do. sink (one Weird stuff regular) does not have the characterization that justifies Maria’s description of her as “bad”. But the residual love, beneath the woman’s turbulent outbursts and traumatic distance, slowly emerges in some genuinely poignant moments, especially as Charlie remembers a family trip with Mary to Oregon when she weighed a lot less, the last time she swam.
Every member of the small group impresses, even the invisible Sathya Sridharan as the friendly pizza delivery boy who never fails to ask about Charlie’s well-being behind a closed apartment door.
Joining Frazier is Chow, who continues his sly and funny work on the Kelly Reichardt film. exhibition With a subtle twist as the woman was knocked sideways in defeat, bracing herself for another devastating blow from him. In both cases, his inability to intervene left him helpless, furious, exhausted and visibly in pain. There’s also humor in Liz’s exasperation at Charlie’s innate positivity, which endures no matter how dire her circumstances. In a film that is partly about the human instinct to care about other people, Chow breaks his heart.
Heroic performance in St. Format Deserving attention, however, is Frazier, who hasn’t been this good since gods and monsters. A great actor who’s been under the radar for far too long, he uses his big puppy dog ​​eyes to great effect, never allowing us to forget that he’s a man scarred by raw emotional wounds beneath a heap of sweaty, hissing flesh.
His physique, which struggles to navigate difficult spaces and maneuver his body, which requires more strength than Charlie let him, is agonizing to watch, as are his bouts of coughing, wheezing, and shortness of breath. On the few occasions when he struggles to his feet, he fills the frame, a figure of immense poignancy less for his size than for his suffering. But in a film about redemption, it’s the immortal humanity of Fraser’s performance that draws you in.
Source: Hollywood Reporter
Emily Jhon is a product and service reviewer at Gossipify, known for her honest evaluations and thorough analysis. With a background in marketing and consumer research, she offers valuable insights to readers. She has been writing for Gossipify for several years and has a degree in Marketing and Consumer Research from the University of Oxford.
