It's a not-so-wonderful life

By the happenstance of streaming release, I saw a strange double-feature on a recent evening, and I replicate the experience with this nonsensical pairing.  First up was the Hulu original, Happiest Season (MC-68).  Now, I am no more drawn to the fantasy of holiday family reunions than I am to the reality of them.  So-called would-be “Christmas classics” are not a party I want to attend or a genre I want to watch, but when the couple going home for the holidays is Kristen Stewart and Mackenzie Davis, maybe I’ll have a look-in.  In the event, they bring way too much emotional firepower to this piece of fluff, which descends into slapstick, also wasting Alison Brie and Aubrey Plaza in the process.  Clea DuVall moves behind the camera, and earns diversity points for making a lesbian romantic comedy, but fails to make use of the fellow actresses she was able to recruit, to deliver something more honest and searching.  And less reliant on the crutch of It’s a Wonderful Life.  The movie’s not a trial to watch, except for the missed opportunity – it could have been so much more.

On the other hand, if Ken Loach’s Sorry We Missed You (MC-82, Kanopy) had been anything more, I’d have been pole-axed.  That’s no surprise, since Loach ranks high in my pantheon of directors, and never strays from troubling topics, this time the impact of the gig economy on gig workers, specifically a Newcastle family where the mother works as an on-call home health aide (or “carer,” as she refers to herself) without contract, benefits, or set schedule.  The father can’t find suitable work in the construction industry anymore, so becomes a franchisee in a package delivery company, where he has to buy his own van and does not get any wages but just a per-package fee for each he delivers, subject to penalties and chargebacks.  Their teen son is bright and artistic, but sees the economic dead end he faces, so acts out through graffiti and other gestures of rebellion.  The cute and also bright preteen daughter acts out the family stress by bedwetting.  It’s all pretty grim, but as usual with Loach the nonprofessional acting is remarkable, and the film’s social and moral argument delivered cogently and forcefully.  Painful to watch, the film reeks of reality and relatability, with the reward of deeper understanding of how the other half lives.

I’ve already written here about Loach’s career, but I am adapting and adding to that summary, to post with my other “career summaries” (in column to right, if you’re on a computer rather than a phone).  More and more, I think, those will become the focus of this blog.