In the late 1980s and early 1990s, a new kind of independent film emerged in the United States — a reaction to all the huge-budget, huge-explosion extravaganzas then dominating the movie market.
These movies were independent in that they did not rely on big-studio money, or very much money at all, and could make modest gains on modest claims.
Some, like the film marked as a key kick-off point for the “indie” surge, Sex, Lies and Videotape, were edgy, introspective movies for grown-ups bored by all the blockbuster bedazzlement. Mainstream Hollywood soon reabsorbed that edginess, and nowadays it’s fair to say that “indie” is a style that may be applied to a film that is or is not financially independent as well.
Win Win is the latest example of this American indie style (and, for all I know, indie budget too): it’s a quirky drama about a New Jersey lawyer, not too rich, not too poor, with an average family (wife, two kids), having to confront some ordinary problems, or at least the problems ordinary people face — not problems like having to save the world from nuclear disaster, having to get the microfilm from the grip of a supervillian, or even having to find out that the guy in black is your father.
Win Win is quirky because if a movie about “ordinary people” is going to be interesting they have to be given something to leaven the potential blandness of simply being ordinary. The filmmakers have to show that these characters are individuals, though you might also say that they are individuals in a rather generic way. We are all individuals.
Steeped in ordinariness
This may be why I didn’t much like Win Win, despite its having some manifest virtues (among them its lack of pretension). The quirkiness is a way of giving flavour to a storyline practically steeped in ordinariness. The quirks are like a tasty powder that comes in a packet and can be sprinkled on top just before the dish is served.
Paul Giamatti plays the New Jersey lawyer, Mike, who has a nice wife and two cute kids but is struggling financially. (The recession is surely the perfect setting for such an ordinary-people tale.)
He descends to chicanery to grab an extra bit of money every month, thereby defrauding an elderly client. And then the old man’s grandson turns up on his doorstep, and Mike has to deal with a surly youth on top of everything else, and possibly his drug-addict mother too.
Luckily, however, the surly youth has hidden talents, bringing some unaccustomed success to Mike’s life, or at least to one of his pursuits — coaching a hopeless schoolboy wrestling team in his spare time. Here we have a sporting theme to provide, I suspect, a sense of progression through the story (a series of contests), as well as the feelgood factor required of such movies.
Halfway through Win Win, I began to feel a sense of dread at the inevitable sporting finale, the cheering crowds, the underdog coming out on top, the cutaway to a teary wife —
Maybe I just don’t get the American sports obsession or its value as narrative. And I’m not sure I get Giamatti, either, which may be part of my problem with Win Win. I couldn’t really see the appeal of his persona either in the lauded Sideways or the more recent Barney’s Version. He’s mildly entertaining, but I for one find his schtick wears thin pretty quickly.
In this movie, the lawyer’s wife (played by Amy Ryan) is both a more interesting character, better written, and a better performance; Alex Shaffer as the surly youth more than stands up to all Giamatti’s business, and he barely speaks at all.
Keeping it shallow
The subsidiary characters, such as Mike’s male chums (Jeffrey Tambor, Bobby Cannavale), are neatly drawn to provide contrast and a little colour, but they’re also pretty obvious.
It might have been interesting had the movie explored the father-son dynamic, or in this case the surrogate-father issue that is clear in Mike’s investment in the youth who has appeared so serendipitously in his life. He has two daughters, after all; could part of his psychodrama be the desire for a son or a son figure? It would be interesting, too, to see that issue explored from the perspective of a father, rather than the usual idea (so casually thrown into so many American movies) of a son seeking a father. But this movie doesn’t want to go deep.
Win Win will probably work for a viewer who, of a weekend evening, feels like something undemanding — not too loud, not too long, not too exciting. A few mundane problems, a few half-laughs. Me, I found it (and Giamatti) increasingly irritating and had to leave about half an hour before the credits. I’m sure it all turned out okay in the end.
Not the Movie of the Week: Frightening Flops and Fabulous Flicks, a selection of Shaun de Waal’s movie reviews over the past 13 years, with added extras, is published by Tafelberg
The book will be launched at Boekehuis in Johannesburg at noon on Saturday, July 9. To see an extract, click here.