Reconciling the life you have with the life you crave
Woody Allen’s latest film, the period tragi-comedy Wonder Wheel contains a child character who shows the makings of a first-rate pyromaniac. While the child and his antics do factor into the story on occasion, usually only in small doses, the plot of Allen’s must be put on hold for these brief moments while his actions are “dealt with.” However even during those particular interruptions, nothing, not even a fire-starting child, can take away from the dreamy nostalgic world Allen has created and the timeless philosophy he weaves throughout it. This time around, The Woodman offers up a classic tragedy of love and life which looks at how both such human facets can carry us all the way up before eventually dropping us straight back to the ground. It is a frustratingly real and oftentimes poetic tale which reinforces the notion that while we don’t always get what we want, we typically we get what we need.
Wonder Wheel opens with Mickey (Justin Timberlake) an aspiring actor/lifeguard at Coney Island in the 1950s. Addressing the audience directly, Mickey tells the story of Ginny (Kate Winslet), a waitress stuck in an unhappy marriage to the well-meaning, but slightly alcoholic Humpty (Jim Belushi). Mickey tells of their stable, if unspectacular, life together which is interrupted by the arrival of Carolina (Juno Temple), Humpty’s long-lost daughter on the run from the mob. Without meaning to, Carolina quickly changes the household dynamics, including Ginny’s love affair with Mickey which threatens to be interrupted when the two meet.
If there’s one aspect of Wonder Wheel which Allen has all but ensured audience will fall in love with, it’s the setting he’s resurrected in order to tell his story. The world of Wonder Wheel is the down-to-earth dreaminess of 1950s Coney Island with beachside restaurants and amusement park rides on the boardwalk. It is a world where life had order, the people were simple and their dreams were limitless. The director adds a whimsical and theatrical device in his use of Mickey as the film’s narrator. With his happy-go-lucky optimism, Mickey is the spinner of the yarn, while also serving as its catalyst. There’s a real chamber piece feel to Wonder Wheel, which extends beyond having Mickey addressing the audience on occasion, but to the style of the film’s acting. The dialogue and the staging all comes across more theatrical than cinematic at times, yet plays wonderfully into the era it’s depicting the way the audience believed it to be; or at least wanted to believe it to be. Adding to the theatricality of the whole affair is Allen’s use color, which is some of the best in recent times. The director drapes virtually every shot in bright flourescents, while costuming his characters in pastels, calling on the kind of whimsical and freeing spirit a place such as Coney Island would have and juxtaposing it with the darkness of the characters’ struggles. Even if Allen does go a bit heavy on the stereotypes from time to time, his love of the world in Wonder Wheel, and the romanticism it possesses, is never in question.
Only a filmmaker such as Allen can seamlessly drop his audience into these characters’ world and focus squarely on their lives as they are then, letting them fill in the gaps as the story moves along. Because of this, Allen instantly reveals the soul and depth within each person on screen. In Wonder Wheel, each of the characters are still mourning lost dreams and potential. Ginny regrets never having pursued her acting career, while Humpty still has regrets about his wife’s death. These are thoughts which extend to their children, with Carolina in particular striving for a chance at redemption after having taken a decidedly wrong turn at such an early part of life. As formalist as Wonder Wheel’s trappings may come across, the film’s realism can be found in the people existing within it. Each of the four principal characters are painted as flawed in some way or another, making them real. Taking things further, Allen gives his characters dimension by testing them; presenting them with situations which dares them to forgeo societal politeness and call upon their own primal emotions. Even Mickey, to whom everyone is an interesting story, performers in the play of life where he’s the audience, is tested in such a way. At a certain point, the dreamiest of the quartet finds himself shed of his romantic ideals and is forced to see the world in front of him for the first time.
The fact that an actress such as Winslet can instantly acquit herself to a world’s such an Allen, and thrive within it, should surprise no one. The actress’s monologue while facing a mirror in which she pretends to be talking to Mickey is the kind of acting Winslet does so well and is one of the movie’s best scenes. She likewise marvels in the final extended scene, doing a kind of acting that tops even her best and taking Ginny to different levels in the space of several minutes. Although I’ve never been a fan of Timberlake’s, Allen manages to bring out a down-to-earth romantic quality from the singer-turned-actor which calls on his curious and optimistic nature. Temple may have the least to do thanks to the nature of her character’s storyline, yet she infuses Carolina with a true purity of hope in the most radiant of ways. The real surprise however is Belushi, who is flat out amazing and turns in the kind of performance that will astound many. The actor takes what is without question the film’s biggest stereotype and brings out his pain and heart through real gravitas.
For me, the final extended sequence of Wonder Wheel couldn’t help but call to mind Irrational Man, the director’s darkly comic 2015 effort. In that film, Joaquin Phoenix plays a college professor named Abe who is suffering from an existential crisis and decides that the best way to rid himself of it is to commit an incredibly dark act. Ginny’s own act in Wonder Wheel’s final section reminds me of Abe’s choice and the commonalities they share. Both say a lot about Allen’s sensibilities as a writer, but beyond that, how he manages to expose the deep barbaric nature which can exist in both men and women. The savageness, desperation and rage are all there; but so is that fundamental burning desire to make the world the way each character so needs it to be. In both Ginny and Abe’s minds, each character feels that in their own way, their acts are making the world better; their worlds at least. What they’re really doing however is plunging themselves further into that special breed of hopelessness and despair to be found whenever anyone tries to fight against their fates.
Wonder Wheel is currently in limited release.
