The Way Way Back

Hey uh, do you recognize this guy? 

Nat Faxon

How about this guy? 

Jim Rash

You probably recognize Faxon from his recent stint as Ben, of Ben and Kate, which just got canceled by Fox. Or, if you're like me, you remember him from Beerfest. And you most definitely recognize Rash as Dean Pelton from Community. But did you know they're BFFs? 

Nat Faxon and Jim Rash

That surprised me enough (somehow they just don't go together in my head, but that's probably type casting), but then I found out they're also writing partners. And I was like, whaaat? And then I found they wrote The Descendents. You know, that little film with George Clooney? The one that won an Oscar last year? 

Nat Faxon and Jim Rash and OSCAR...and Alex Payne

So at this point I was pretty blown away. And then I went to see this new movie called The Way Way Back. And (you should see this coming by now, really) I found out Nat Faxon and Jim Rash WROTE AND DIRECTED THAT SHIZ. And that they set it on the Cape because they're FROM the Cape. I'm from (near) the Cape! I practically know these guys! We're practically the same people! 

And all of these little nuggets of golden knowledge just made the film--which was already great--totally awesome. Which reminds me, let's talk about the film. 

GOOD THINGS 

The characterizations in this film (for the most part--more on that later), were pretty amazing. The protagonist, a 13 year old boy, was so real and inarticulate and awkward it was painful. Steve Carrell's character was expertly written and acted. Textbook abuser, obsessed with control, subtly manipulative. Way worse than the usually over the top performance/writing of a similar character might have been. He felt soul-less. He felt scary. He felt way more threatening than if he had been physically abusive or even obviously mean to Toni Colette. He felt like he could very easily suck this woman dry, with relish. It was awesome.

Next door neighbor lady (aka Allison Janney) was a-fucking-mazing, as always. She really is one of the best actresses working right now. Incredible. Wonderful. Can't say enough good things. The scene where she says goodbye to Toni Collete is heartbreaking and adorable and I loved it. 

Toni Colette was brilliant. As always. She's really good at playing not-great, but well-intentioned moms (Little Miss Sunshine, About a Boy). Whoever that kid is with the lazy eye, he's a friggin' great actor. His banter with Janney was one of the best parts of the film. Loved seeing the Cape represented. Made me wish I ever actually went there. Just so happy and excited to see Rob Corddry in anything (I effing love Rob Corddry, I am so weirdly attracted to Rob Corddry, I can't even talk about it). 

BAD THINGS 

And now the weird, typical, of course issues I have with this film. Remember when I said all the characters were expertly written and portrayed? Yeah, scratch the teenage girls off that list. Steve Carrell's daughter was ANNOYING and so fake, in an obvious joke kind of way, not a this-a-real-person-who-happens-to-be-very-inauthentic way. She was an abrupt and startling caricature in a cast of mostly well-rounded, interesting people. It felt like she existed to prove how shitty teenage girls are. And Susanna's character, though not annoying, was just another spin-off on the pixie dream girl stereotype, too good for her old friends, too smart to hang out with other teenagers, too beautiful...too blah. Watching Susanna took me right back to fifth grade, when I walked around for a year with my stomach sucked in because I was too fat. I was ten. Susanna (aka Anna Sophia Robb) looks like a Bratz doll. She is a beautiful girl, don't get me wrong, and I don't begrudge the actress her figure (her waist is seriously half the size of her hips). But it was pretty disappointing to see her in this role about teenage coming-of-age, in a film where the teen boy is so achingly (and sometimes unattractively) real. I wish the girl was the same. I wish she'd been allowed to be NOT PERFECT, and still wanted. 

And then there was that scene with "holding". I don't know, the gender dynamics in this were just really weird, with young girls pretty much just existing just for T&A. Even Maya Rudolph's character, who was not ogled, was one-dimensional (read: virginal, read: girlfriend material, she only got kissed once, and on the head). Which is pretty disappointing, given how real the male character(s) felt. Which is doubly disappointing, because I'd hate for a teenage boy to love this movie and connect with the main character, and continue to treat girls like eye candy and nothing more, not as a result of this movie obviously, but this movie definitely buys into that mentality… 

Which is all very strange really, when you consider that this film comes from the producers of Little Miss Sunshine and Juno. Two films with heavy themes of feminism and testing gender stereotypes. Little Miss Sunshine has the whole pageants plot, and Olive with her round little stomach and big glasses, which plays with her indoctrination into gender stereotypes through her desire to be a beauty queen. Juno, of course, has Juno. Who doesn't give a shit about your gender stereotypes. 

So it's a little weird that The Way Way Back is so…way, way back, so old school, when it comes to progressive treatment of women. :/ 

This was also not my fave part for Sam Rockwell. And I say that as a huge Sam Rockwell fan. I could hardly understand what he was saying most of the time, and I don't think the jokester stand-up comedian act actually fit well on him at all. He seems more suited to dry, smart humor, rather than a hundred jokes a second, throw everything at the wall and hope something sticks. It's not like I'm actually complaining, because I love Sam Rockwell and I love any excuse to watch Sam Rockwell (shirtless), but…maybe a bit of a mis-cast here? Someone else might have fit the character a little better…and his "chemistry" with Maya Rudolph made me a little uncomfortable. Why were they so brother-sisterish? She acted like his kid sister. Remember the kiss on the forehead? It was all weird.

Am I the only one getting weird vibes here?

WOW I SOUND REALLY NEGATIVE ABOUT SAM ROCKWELL. It's making me sort of hate myself. He was wonderful in his scenes with the kid, that was a really amazing (and integral) part of the film, so don't let anything I just said stop you from seeing the movie, he's not awesome for Sam Rockwell, which is still 100x awesomer than most actors. Let's move on. 

Overall? This was a really great movie. And a really great experience. And it had this.