Young Adult | Review

Charlize Theron’s much anticipated performance in Young Adult has arrived, and it’s been a worthwhile wait. That’s not to say the rest of the film, the second pairing of director Jason Reitman and screenwriter Diablo Cody, reuniting from their 2007 success, Juno, is also meritorious. Theron’s alcoholic, narcissist harpy seems like the tempered cousin of Cameron Diaz’s equally fun-but-foul teacher of this year’s Bad Teacher. Except Theron’s trapped in an oppressively bungled and mean-spirited message movie about homecoming and the misguided notion that we all can relate to consequences associated with harboring fantasies about our “glory days,” i.e., high school.

We’re introduced to the slovenly Mavis Gary (Theron) as she stumbles blearily through her sloppy Minneapolis high-rise apartment, the television tuned to teenage girl reality TV, where we get snippets of juvenile histrionics and the Kardashians. As she rips off her sticky false boobs from the former night’s endeavors, we’re led to realize that Mavis uses this (and snatches of teenage girl adolescent conversations) as fodder for her failing young adult book series that she ghost writes. Having recently divorced and her writing success on the wane, Mavis receives an email from her high-school ex-boyfriend containing a picture of his newborn daughter, which seems to send her into a complete, psychotic tailspin. Jamming a tape containing 1990’s music in the tape deck of her bright red Mini Cooper (far from feeling super duper, and she sure ain’t satisfied) the credits roll as she careens off to her hometown of Mercury, Minnesota, in pursuit of happiness, or something like it.

Under the guise of a “small real estate thing,” she checks into a Hampton Inn and immediately plots to abscond with her old beau, Buddy Slade (Patrick Wilson), nefariously planning to steal him from his simple, happy wife. But before she is able to sink her claws into Buddy, she meets another old high-school pal at a local dive bar, Matt Freehauf (Patton Oswalt), a nerd she barely noticed from those golden days. It’s only after she sees that Matt is crippled that she remembers him as the “hate-crime guy,” recalling that he was severely beaten by a group of jocks for being gay, except that he wasn’t and isn’t gay (and never mind that this would pre-date Matthew Shepard, meaning “hate crime” was not the identifier afforded gay bashing during this time period). Her apparent alcoholism and vicious superiority complex are fun and attractive to Matt, the black hole of Mavis a welcome departure from his stale life living with his bitter sister (Collette Wolfe). As Mavis and Matt bond over her wicked home-wrecker plot, which she brazenly and ridiculously barrels forward with, it becomes obvious that Mavis is having a sort of psychotic episode. Seemingly unable to pick up on cues from Buddy Slade that he’s happy right where he is, Mavis gleefully throws herself into one awkward experience after another, until we’re finally treated to one climactic scene where we learn what it was about her relationship with Buddy Slade that has her so fixated on returning to her past with such garish conviction.

The most notable and memorable aspect of Young Adult’s awkwardly maligned narrative is Theron’s wickedly warped performance of a woman whose adulthood has veered into a mediocre failure. And her chemistry with the damaged Oswalt makes for some exceptionally comedic, bittersweet cinema. But any scenes not pairing Theron and Oswalt seem like the brakes are grinding. Certainly, beautiful people make bad decisions all the time, but Theron’s Mavis is just not realistically disillusioned or drunk enough not to see the ridiculousness of her fantasy plan. She’s able to muse aloud to her distant parents that she may be alcoholic, but is clearly unable to see that her ex-boyfriend is undeniably simple, more than happily married, and worst of all, not interested in her obvious advances. And while it’s realistic that she’s callous enough to call her confidante Oswalt lumpy behind his back and deliriously bitchy enough to refer to his “incident” from high school a literal crutch he uses today so that he doesn’t have to do anything with his life, we’re treated to an insanely capricious turn in their relations by the film’s end. And to top that off, this is followed by a glib conversation about who was really “at their best” in high school.

Unfortunately, Young Adult suffers from a tediously rambling screenplay. While Diablo Cody has thankfully dropped the kitschy vernacular popularized in Juno (and unwisely used again in her doltish Jennifer’s Body screenplay in 2009) it’s almost impossible not to assume that many of this character’s tics may be borrowed from her own experiences as a writer, her fame (or at least profit) from fiction for young girls having already lost its vitality. While she may have created a glorious supernova protagonist, Cody seems unable to write a convincing narrative that includes other realistic supporting characters. This is a one woman showcase that plays more like an elitist adolescent nightmare than it is a tale about an adolescent minded, monster female adult.

Jason Reitman’s films often feel like independently-minded mainstream packages developed to be consumed by mainstream audiences who can feel like they too know how to indulge and consume “indie” cinema. It’s not surprising that it often feels like Reitman’s films are dictated by star-power casting, with his latest being no exception, with the director publicly stating he wouldn’t do Young Adult without Theron. But the problem lies in the fact that it feels like Reitman’s directorial efforts were torn between the orbits of Theron doing her damndest and Cody’s crippled, episodic screenplay. None of their orbits seem reconciled at any one time, making several key moments of the film unintentionally awkward. While it’s certainly nice to see a group of small town Minnesotans sport artifacts of cultural relevance, wearing shirts advertising The Breeders and The Pixies (and also not looking like little houses, per Anna Wintour’s 2009 dismissal of the state’s denizens) any kindheartedness afforded them is erased by an exchange between Mavis and Sandra Freehauf, Matt’s sister. Mavis gripes about how everyone is so happy with so little, living in such as sad, small town, to which Sandra responds that “none of them matter and they should just die.” Pass another piece of bitter pie, but one could say the same about Reitman’s latest—it’s happy with very little and it doesn’t really matter.

Rating 2.5 stars