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Demolition: Mini-review

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Jake Gyllenhaal

Jake Gyllenhaal plays another quirky character in Demolition

CTearing one’s clothes is a sign of mourning in some cultures. However, Davis Mitchell, Jake Gyllenhaal’s character in the new movie Demolition, goes well beyond this as he systematically dismantles his entire house after his wife dies in an auto accident. Eventually, the house falls apart, and so too does the movie.

Davis at first feels nothing after his wife’s death, but after his father-in-law Phil (Chris Cooper) makes a comment about taking things apart before putting them together again, Davis quits going to work and compulsively disassembles or destroys everything he can. Soon, his only human contact is Karen (Naomi Watts), an equally troubled woman who takes Davis in.

Demolition was directed by Jean-Marc Vallée, whose two previous films, Wild and Dallas Buyers Club also featured people who deal with tragedy in their lives in bizarre ways. The difference is that the other two films were based on real people, while Davis Mitchell is merely a symbol. As played by Gyllenhaal, Davis is relatable, a man who eventually realizes he never really felt much about anything before. But instead of giving Davis’ actions some degree of credibility in Demolition, the script by Bryan Sipe merely comes up with increasingly outlandish acts of destruction, culminating in a scene in which Davis persuades Karen’s teenage son (an excellent Judah Lewis) to shoot him while Davis wears a bulletproof vest. Since, in real life, Davis would have been institutionalized halfway through the film, Vallée and Sipe clearly intend Demolition as a metaphorical film. But it’s not funny enough to succeed as dark comedy and not uplifting enough to succeed as magical whimsy, despite a final feel-good scene. The best scenes in Demolition are those between Gyllenhaal and Lewis, which suggest that a more realistic film about Davis’ new “family” might have succeeded. However, that storyline ends abruptly and rather arbitrarily, as if Vallée had decided that the movie had gone on long enough. Gyllenhaal’s performance and chemistry with Lewis make Demolition watchable, but the audience will wish that someone had repaired the damage to the script before filming.
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A Walk in the Woods: Mini-review

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Robert Redford

This movie is A Piece of Cake for Robert Redford

B-Supposedly, Robert Redford acquired the rights to Bill Bryson’s memoir, A Walk in the Woods, a decade ago as a planned re-teaming with Paul Newman that sadly never occurred. A decade later, Redford finally gets to take his walk, actually a hike down the Appalachian Trail, only now his companion is Nick Nolte. Redford, Nolte, and the Trail are as good as ever, but the movie’s script has definitely seen better days.

At the start of A Walk in the Woods,  Bryson (Redford) has lost his zest for writing and feels he is just going through the motions. On a whim, he decides to hike the Trail, mostly to prove to himself he still can. His understanding wife (Emma Thompson) insists he take a companion, and the only person who will go is Stephen Katz (Nolte), an estranged buddy from his bachelor days traveling around Europe decades earlier. What Bryson soon learns is that Katz’s life has gone steadily downhill since then.

Unlike last year’s Wild with Reese Witherspoon, A Walk in the Woods conveys little about the experience of long-distance hiking other than an occasional picturesque vista captured by director Ken Kwapis. Instead, the movie consists of Redford’s wry sarcasm and Nolte’s huffing and grumbling. Both are fun to watch (Walk comes close to the star-reading-the-phone-book level at times), and they have an easy-going chemistry together that could easily support another hour of film. The movie’s plot, however, doesn’t support even the existing 100 minutes or so. It consists mostly of comic interludes with angry bears and angrier husbands (when Katz flirts with a woman in a laundromat), followed by the inevitable bonding moment when the duo get into real trouble. Director Kwapis has mostly worked in television, and Walk has the feel of an overlong sitcom episode with two big name stars. Redford and Nolte, for their part, are content to stay within the script and use their enormous charisma and screen presence to improve some fairly routine gags. They may have aged, but their timing and acting skills are as good as ever. A Walk in the Woods is enjoyable solely for the opportunity to see two great actors having some fun onscreen in what nowadays are rare starring roles  It’s only when the movie ends, rather abruptly, that we realize that the film should have accomplished more during their time on the trail.
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