Two things I have to start out with. I am ordered to say that my husband, David, fell asleep during "Golden Exits," and that, while set in Brooklyn Heights, that section of the borough got better representation on "The Patty Duke Show" and in "Moonstruck."
I can understand why the director, Alex Ross Perry, wanted to use Mary-Louise Parker, as both his script, and the role she plays have derivations of David Auburn's "Proof," which she originated on Broadway, to a TONY winning fare thee well, back in 2000. My God, has it really been seventeen years?
Mary-Louise Parker's brilliance as an actress cannot be overstated. The way she internalizes, getting at the core of her character, makes her start out on a technical virtuosity where most other actors eventually end up. To watch her act is fascinating, as she always makes you probe her characters' minds, while offering those interested a brilliant exercise in the art of acting.
Alas, her penchant for picking projects lately has not been as keen as her acting. "Golden Exits," like her last work on Broadway, "Heisenberg," by Simon Stephens, where she and Denis Arndt offered more of an acting exercise than a narrative, is not much different.
Which is pretty much what "Golden Exits," is, though it is not without potential.
Mary-Louise Parker and Chloe Sevigny play sisters Gwendolyn (Parker) and Alyssa (Sevigny) who are two of the warmest siblings since Goneril and Regan. Alyssa is married to a nerdy archivist, who is working on his wife's father's archival legacy--apparently the sisters are the daughters of some erudite academic--which eldest daughter, Gwen, (Mary-Louise) hovers over protectively, like a black widow spider. She is unmarried, which makes one pause to wonder about the relationship with her father. Shades of "Proof," dears."
Another fabulous actress, Lily Rabe, is on hand as Gwen's personal assistant.
With these three alone, the film offers terrific dramatic potential; it might have been a bit of "King Lear" crossed with "Macbeth."
But the fires are never sparked, because Perry offers an at times tedious non-narrative that is more like a Master Class in acting, where everyone speaks in slow, carefully modulated tones, exposing inner techniques more than psyches. The ladies are fascinating, especially Mary-Louise, but I could tell her Gwen was just seething underneath, and I wanted to see her explode and go at Alyssa. But the moment never comes.
As for the men, Adam Horovitz, as Nick, insults all archivists, offering a nebbishy stereotype of those in the profession, while Jason Schwartzman is just some dumb straight Brooklyn dude, more out of Williamsburg than Brooklyn Heights.
Emily Browning, as the supposedly nubile research assistant, who is brought into the mix to create a kind of "Oleanna" situation, is so childlike, except in a bar scene with Schwartzman, that she is not strong enough or hot enough to titillate anyone. She also acts like she is not sure what film she is in. If there is ever another remake of "David Copperfield,"(and I am sure there will be) right now, she would be the perfect Dora.
You gotta LOVE, and I mean LOVE, the three actresses, to sit through this exercise. There is a film buried within, yet Perry, who also wrote it, does not take the time to extract the potential from within.
And his title is misleading. It should have been called "Castration."
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