Wonder Wheel (2017)

Overrated and overhyped

Crappy film

It's a movie as timely as it is provocative and amazingly, for much of its running time, it is weirdly funny.

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

My wife and I each watched this movie, at different times, on Amazon streaming. Woody Allen has made a practice of writing and directing one movie each year and this is the one for 2017. The novelty is that it was made for Amazon with limited release, mostly in foreign countries, but available for streaming. It is a typical Allen movie with tangled relationships and infidelity as a main theme. The sets, especially for interior scenes, look more like a stage play than a movie, and the characters speak broadly with large gestures, commonly using words and phrases that Allen prefers.None of that is good nor bad, it is just how it is, a Woody Allen movie. A couple in the 1950s living and working on Coney Island, both their second marriages. Her son loves to set fires, some in very dangerous places. His daughter returns after a hasty marriage to a man connected to the mob. They have lots of arguments, they shout at each other a lot.I enjoyed it as 90 minutes of entertainment, it has a somewhat dark ending as the daughter disappears after a date. Kate Winslet has to carry the whole movie and she does it very well.

My opinion of this film is a little divided. To me Woody Allen is a genius script writer and director, especially considering his movies of the last 15 years or so. Vicky Cristina Barcelona and Midnight in Paris, to name only two, are flawless masterpieces. Prior to this, however, I was never a fan of his because of the high levels of neurosis I perceived in his characters and general plots. But this changed, and he evolved. Wonder Wheel was for me a return in part to this high, unpleasant emotion, at times delivered in unrealistically dramatised and seemingly unending monologues. Not only because of this, but also due to the somewhat weak portrayal and story of most protagonists, the film somehow lacked a connection with reality, and the empathy with the human condition that Woody Allen can be so adept at portraying in his most charming and insightful creative moments. For what the film was, the cast were all wonderful. I'm not always a fan of Kate Winslet, but she really shone. I've enjoyed Justin Timberlake from his first foray into acting. But the star of the movie was Jim Belushi. In other aspects, the cinematography and lighting was often stunning. The editing and plot were excellent. Technique was there. But still, I was left with an unsatisfied, fairly insubstantial experience and within minutes of it being over it was as if I'd not seen a film at all. It was unfortunately unmemorable.

I can see coming to this a bit later why it got some negative reviews and didn't do well with audiences: our main character here (as seen through the eyes of lifeguard Justin Timberlake), as played by Kate Winslet, is a miserable person. I don't know how much of that translated as her being just unhappy or that her misery turned her so much into being unlikable that it turned off audiences. It's certainly not an easy movie to take in that regard, as Ginny is not someone who is only in a loveless marriage (that may be arguable too as Jim Belushi's character has love for her, just not much on the return side), or with a hopeless kid (who is a pyro, which I'll get to in a moment), but who's dreams were completely dashed for... one of those ordinary, hard-knock lives that, well, we all leave. I think if Woody Allen had tried to present this script to Brian Cox in ADAPTATION he'd have been yelled at and forced out of his class.While Ginny is unhappy and ultimately does some bad things (one that she can never walk back from even if she tried), I think it was wise for Allen to cast Kate Winslet. Like Cate Blanchett a couple years ago in Blue Jasmine, this is a BIG character in how she projects herself, only her delusions of grandeur only come out when she isn't quite so unhappy around the Timberlake character. She wanted to be an actress but had to give it up, as so many of us give up the things we want to be or strive for, to... marry and have a kid (though a former husband/lover is alluded to as well). On top of this, the whole surrounding I think has to be deliberate; set this movie on a regular street corner and it wouldn't have the same pop. Here, there may be a suggestion of the carnival going on with the setting on Coney Island - Allen channeling Fellini and other giant-emotional Italian filmmakers but on a different level - as there's all this fun around everyone and yet life is the continuous struggle it always is, and compounded by that.But back to Winslet, there's something about her as a presence on screen where you instinctively want to feel sympathy for her, and her star quality lends itself to that (maybe Allen was aiming for a sort of Joan Crawford thing here too, I can't be sure). I think with someone else, it would be much more difficult to watch what Ginny does and becomes her, the decisions she makes with this "poetic" lifeguard, and that the tone is SO theatrical. The lighting reflects this too, as Storaro in some scenes will change the lighting as if it were on stage, as characters like Ginny talk about something and it becomes redder or bluer or more orange or white. The setting helps to accentuate this, and I liked that aspect of it. And along with Winslet, Belushi, Temple and Timberlake are playing to the balcony.Again, I can see why this doesn't work for a lot of people. There were times watching it when I thought it was going TOO big even within the context Allen had set up. And it's not exactly the newest kind of ground for Allen (though in full disclosure, infidelity dramas are like catnip for me). But I still felt engaged because the writing of them was interesting, and I found it fascinating how Allen was navigating this look and feel that was hyper-realistic, of the color scheme being so bright and popping out like out of a selection of postcards from the era, and yet having dialog that attempts at least to stay in realism... except when monologues come flying and the theatrical comes around again. And Ginny's son fits in as a running-gag as metaphor; no matter what traditional punishment comes (spanking) or in psychological ways (therapy), the kid will continue to burn things because the fire is... something that's tangible, I suppose (love doesn't seem to be there at any rate - do we ever see Ginny actually show affection for her son? Doesn't seem like it to me, with the migranes and self-involvement).I'm not sure it all works, but enough of it did, plus the performances, that I'd put it in the category (like Cafe Society) as a very strong minor work (or a decent major one).

In true fashion for Woody Allen, this story follows his passion for melodramatic stories, as a Coney Island Lifeguard (Justin Timberlake) tells the tale of his love affair with a woman many years his senior (Kate Winslet) and the visitor who turns their lives upside down.This is by all accounts a Woody Allen film, layered with the narrating guide, complex characters, love affairs, nostalgic vision and melodrama - Allen is back at it again with his usual form, but it's certainly no Manhattan or Blue Jasmine. The nostalgic tone in which Allen tells this tale is wonderfully sweeping, the characters are fittingly complex but there is a lack of care given to the story. Evidently, the desired effect is a swooning melodrama but what disturbs this is the stilted and neck jerking dialogue. The witty, sharp and echoing notes from the likes of Annie Hall are all but forgotten, the dialogue is wooden, clunky and artificial, it all but puts the brakes on every performance in the film and the drama itself.Performances neither fall flat or excel and only a few are even believable as people rather than characters, as they sound overplayed and over-written. Emotionally Wonder Wheel works for the most part but the characters feel forced, through the overwritten development of their stories and a side plot that never capitalizes on its own tension and barely begs interest, Wonder Wheel misses its melodramatic mark. The love affairs and jealousy can only hold interest for wavering periods and the fantastical setting of Coney Island barely warrants a footnote, Allen vastly underuses the setting of Coney Island as a backdrop but he does stage scenes with the same precision that is expected of him. Winslet also gives her all to her part, it gives her character and much of the story its honest and engrossing appeal and overshadows her co-stars, Temple never gets a moment in the limelight, Timberlake figuratively never leaves the water and Belushi is an overcooked caricature.Wonder Wheel is however, surprisingly stylish, with enticing cinematography and a dapper soundtrack to boot. Allen's nostalgia-driven vision for this piece shines in this regard, there is an old-world style of beauty about it, even incorporating older techniques of lighting as well as camera work, bringing to the forefront that this is a movie that was made, a way of filmmaking that is somewhat lost today in favor of all-encompassing plainness.Wonder Wheel is an echo of Woody Allen's filmmaking, it's stylishly sharp, enticing and sweeping with a nostalgic flair that adds delight to the picture. However, the stunted and artificial dialogue pales to Allen's former work and is uncharacteristically disruptive, damaging the performances, extensive melodrama and evocative storytelling. Wonder Wheel sits dismally in Allen's impressive and vast body of work and is largely forgettable.