One Day (2011)

Supposedly, there's a mini-series of this on Netflix released this year. I saw the movie version  in 2011, and I wrote about it at the time of the film's release.

"July 15ths with Emma and Dex"
or
"Same Time Next Year"

Can a man and woman "just" be friends? (the question posed by When Harry Met Sally)  I've gone 'round and 'round with this one. I've said "Yes" for many years, and then that became "No," then back to "Yes," and now, it's something of a toss-up. "It's possible," I say noncommittally (which is the basis for many of the male-female problems, friendship or no).

But anything is possible.

 
"One Day" was a nifty best-seller by David Nicholls, smart, tight and funny, a romance told in snap-shots of one day that was realistic about the vagaries of life and love and the "yin" and "yang" of both. What makes the novel special gets distilled somewhat in celluloid form, making One Day feel a bit less exceptional, the humor muted somewhat, and given the twenty year time-span of the movie, some of the anniversaries celebrated are given short shrift, skipping to the more complicated "good parts," as opposed to those years when nothing much happens...you know, like "life."*

Dexter (Jim Sturgess) and Emma (Anne Hathaway) have "just met" at their graduation as they string along with their mutual friends, a couple. Emma is bookish, unstylish, a bit of a character—has a "nice personality"—Dexter is boyishly handsome and knows it, and Emma is "crushing." An awkward "overnight" happens, where it is unclear what transpired, but it's important enough that Dexter is helping Emma move when the next 15th of July occurs, but not important enough that Dexter isn't moving to Paris to teach.

July's come and July's go, as Emma suffers through waitressing at a London Tex-Mex restaurant and Dexter jumps from job to job, eventually becoming  the smarmy host for a late-night dance teen program. Where Emma is a busy bee, droning through know-where jobs until she catches her big break, Dex is a moth attracted to the brightest (or blondest) thing in the room. They're devoted to each other, but only so far. As her star rises, his sets—first Mom (the ever-reliable Patricia Clarkson) dies of cancer, then his fortunes go South, followed by years of over-indulgence. Before you can say "This is Mrs. Norman Maine," he is seeking her out, where she has nearly given up. As traditional as this is, what is nice about One Day is that Emma does just fine without him, she makes her way in the world without a man's help (and frequently, they're a hindrance), whereas in most films of the romantic genre, everything can be solved by anything in pants.

The director, Lone Scherfig, previously made An Education, which, while well-acted and elegantly directed, suffered from a distinct lack of heat and a little too much posh. The former problem still applies here. The film is decidedly chilly in tone, and while this is a welcome change from the day-glo color, syrupy music rom-coms that chirp incessantly about Moon, June, (premarital) Honeymoon," poking you in the heart-area that "Love is Great, right? RIGHT?" One Day makes it hard to feel anything beyond "Gee...that sucks."

Maybe it's the skipping around from year to year, but there's a distinct lack of focus in the story, as it spreads itself around a bit too thin, the ancillary characters populating the movie to make life difficult for Emma and Dexter, necessary irritants and bothers that will drive them into each other's arms every year. Plus, the story arcs of the two main characters run precipitously up and down, without any jolts of happiness amidst the gloom, or hurdles to happiness on the ascent.**

Things settle down as people "settle" and, although One Day manages to avoid many of the cliches of the romantic genre, it also hasn't found anything as compelling to replace them. Plus, with the mutual reversals of fortune, there seems to be a dramatically required "leveling of the playing field" in order for things to resolve "the way they should".

One should be grateful that one is asking these questions about a romance movie (haven't done that in a while), so it's nice to see somebody making the attempt. But, one gets the idea that the same old "Love Potion No.9" is being hawked. All they've done is change the shape of the bottle.

* One of my favorite quotes is by Anton Chekhov: Any idiot can survive a crisis; it's the day-to-day living that wears you down.

**  Well, that's not entirely true, but we don't want to give anything away. 

Venus

Roger Michell died last year at the age of 65, before his latest film The Duke was released. It is out now and I recommend seeing it, especially in a theater, where it will do the most good. Michell's most popular film is probably Notting Hill, but he also made The Mother and Enduring Love (for you Daniel Craig fans), Hyde Park on Hudson (with Bill Murray as Franklin Roosevelt), and Morning Glory (with Rachel McAdams, Harrison Ford and Diane Keaton)—which we'll be looking at tomorrow. To sum up, he made movies that are usually placed in "art-houses" where films of a limited budget and less than frivolus subject matter, unsullied by hyperbolic press and saturation campaigns go to die...and merit consideration during Awards Season, where sometimes their fortunes are favored, but mostly forgotten. And he was darned good at it. 

 

Here's a look at one of his films—featuring another amazing performance of Peter O'Toole. It was also the feature film debut of Jodie Whitaker, who made history as the 13th Doctor Who. This was written at the time of the film's release on DVD.

 

Venus (Roger Michell, 2006) Peter O'Toole, in an interview in the special features section of the Venus" DVD sums it up as a story between "a dirty old man and a slutty young woman." Exactly, and if it had been sold like that it would have made much more money at the box-office. As it is, the film has to stand on its own merits, which are considerable. Hanif Kureishi's script is literate but low-down, full of humanity in all its frailties, both young and old, well-played by a stellar cast. And that's where the elements of specialness occur:

1) O'Toole--he plays an elderly thespian who, these days, "specializies in corpses," who has lived an impulsive romantic life, and in the winter of his discontent, still does. O'Toole makes the most of the words, but, more than any other actor, knows what to do between the lines. O'Toole is frail, but not THIS frail, and his tremulousness is a stunning act of craft over pride. He's not alone.

2) Playing the ex-wife he abandoned with three kids ("under six," she reminds him) is Vanessa Redgrave, the greatest actress extant, who does the part sans make-up, unglamourously and brilliantly. To see O'Toole and Redgrave play a scene together for the first time is a great event, and should be required viewing for all aspiring actors. These two actors, once coltish and prancing, now old and playing broken down is heart-breaking, but exciting (I'm starting to sound like bloody James Lipton!)

3) Jodie Whittaker, in a seemingly artless way, matches them. That is not an insignificant thing. Picked, no doubt, because she resembles the young Vanessa Redgrave, one waits for the scene where the two meet. The viewer is not disappointed.

4) A scene where O'Toole, humiliated, goes for a walk and finds himself at a small, humble proscenium--the benches covered and strewn with leaves and garbage, as the soundtrack becomes awash with O'Toole's voice from past performances of different eras and different fidelities that's as fine as any piece of film I've ever seen

5) A waitress at the old actor's favorite eating hole sees a picture of the young actor in the paper. "Gawd, he was GO-geous, wasn't he?" Someone should make another starrer for O'Toole and call it "Give The Man The Friggin' Oscar He So Richly Deserves, Already" and be done with it.

2022 Update: Peter O'Toole was nominated for 8 Best Actor Performances and received an "Honorary Award" in 2003.