An actress tackles a sensational story

  Gracie was 36 when she slept with Joe. He was 13. 

  She went to jail for her choice and gave brith to a baby (his) while incarcerated. May December,  a movie about the aftermath of their affair, begins 20 years after Joe and Gracie made national news.

   The age difference disturbs, of course, but equally important, is the fact that Joe's marriage deprived him of the opportunity to grow into the role of husband and father. Joe and Gracie, who live in Savannah, Ga., have three kids, all older than Joe was when their life-changing affair began.

   In what feels like an attempt to give the story some mind-bending dimension, director Todd Haynes focuses on the arrival of Elizabeth (Natalie Portman), an actress who will play Gracie (Julianne Moore) in a movie that's soon to start filming.

   Elizabeth becomes increasingly insistent as she explores the lives of the characters who lived the story.

   Absorbing and quietly challenging, May December engages us in a pursuit similar to the one Elizabeth undertakes. We're continually trying to process scenes that don't quite compute, a father trying to relate to a teenage son who's going through a stage he never experienced.

     As she tires to nail the character, Elizabeth meets Gracie and her two twins (Gabriel Chung and Elizabeth Yu), teens who are about to graduate from high school, leaving Gracie and Joe (Charles Melton) as empty-nesters. An older daughter — the one born in prison — already has left home.

     Think about your life. Is the person you loved at 17 someone you could have spent the rest of your days with?  We wonder whether Joe and Gracie really love each other or have backed themselves into a corner, trapped into justifying behavior few would condone.

    The screenplay's focus on acting elevates content that easily might have turned trashy. As a result, May December hinges on Portman's performance as an actress who tries to penetrate Gracie's soul, ultimately in shockingly disreputable ways. Can acting be viewed as an invasion of privacy, even an act of aggression?  

   Under the guise of professionalism, Elizabeth also explores the salacious nature of the material. When she visits the stock room in the pet shop where both Gracie and Joe once worked and where they were caught having sex, she allows her imagination to reproduce Gracie's moment of ecstatic abandon. 

     Fortunately, the owner of the pet shop remains otherwise occupied and out of view.

    Portman's performance requires a degree of subtlety and seduction. Initially, she must seduce the audience, asking that we grant her the presumption of professional curiosity. But as the movie develops, Elizabeth's twisted psyche becomes more evident.

   Elizabeth’s quest broadens the movie’s scope: She talks to a variety of Savannah residents, including the man to whom Gracie was married (D.W. Moffett) at the time of her dalliance. She also meets with the lawyer (Lawrence Arancio) who represented Gracie at her trial and with her son (Cory Michael Smith) from her first marriage.

      Questions of control -- Gracie's over Joe and the rest of her family -- are reflected in the way Moore shifts identities: mother, seductress, wife, and lover.  

      Only Melton's Joe seems an innocent participant in a drama he never really controlled. Joe breeds butterflies, an overly obvious symbolic reference to his inability to escape the cocoon of his marriage and blossom into a fully developed adult.

       Should we believe Gracie when, late in the movie, she insists that Joe initiated their sexual relationship? And even if her assertion were true, does it altar the fact that she was an adult and he was still a kid?

      Those familiar with Haynes's work (Far From Heaven and Carol) won't be surprised that Haynes has little interest in sanctioning his characters or generating undue sympathy for Gracie, a woman who, after all, spent time in jail for second-degree rape.

      In the end, May December is as much about the way Haynes and his two principal actresses toy with the story than about the story itself. He provokes us to ask questions that revolve around a central inquiry,  "What becomes of people who have lived through this kind of experience?"

    With a screenplay by Samy Burch and Alex Mechanik, May December is more than a trashy TV movie. Viewers may disagree about how much more because Haynes can confound as much as he clarifies, leaving us to wonder whether we're meant to take everything we see at face value.

     Whatever you decide, you may find yourself realizing that in the game Haynes and his cast of characters are playing, no one emerges victorious. 

A lawyer takes on a major corporation

Mark Ruffalo stars in Dark Waters, a movie that uses a deliberate approach in creating a drama of betrayed trust.

Making a movie about a complex legal case that spanned 17 years can't be easy. Director Todd Haynes and star Mark Ruffalo accomplish the daunting task in Dark Waters, the story of an Ohio attorney who takes on DuPont, one of the world's leading chemical companies.

Ruffalo portrays Rob Bilott, a Cincinnati-based attorney who specializes in defending companies like DuPont. After some initial foot-dragging, Bilott agrees to represent a West Virginia farmer (Bill Camp) whose cattle are being poisoned by toxic waste that has been dumped near his acreage. Bilott's target: DuPont.

Those familiar with Haynes' work (Wonderstruck, Carol, Far From Heaven) know that he can be as much stylist as a storyteller. But here, Haynes works in an unassuming fashion. He's wise enough to know that a story that impacts so many people needs little embellishment.

Dark Waters moves beyond the plight of a single farmer to encompass the drinking water of an entire town. The chemical in question also was used in Teflon, a non-stick coating familiar to most Americans.

Early on, we meet the head of Bilott's law firm. Tim Robbins portrays an attorney who eventually buys into Bilott's mission, a stance that doesn't please all the partners. Some of them view Bilott as a traitor who's biting the hands that feed the firm.

And Tim's wife ( Anne Hathaway impressive in a smallish role) isn't blindly supportive; she resents the fact that the case takes Bilott away from his children.

Among the supporting cast, Victor Garber also stands out as the head of DuPont. Initially cordial, Garber's character turns vicious when his company's interests are threatened.

But it's Ruffalo who carries the movie; he creates a portrait of an attorney who couldn't be less slick. As a church-going ordinary guy, Bilott feels no need to put self-righteousness on display.

Bilott's case against DuPont involves the use of a chemical called PFOA. It takes lots of heavy research to discover what the chemical is and how it has been used. Persistence trumps genius-level legal maneuvers.

You might say that everyone involved with the production -- from cinematographer Ed Lachman to Haynes -- serves a story that rightly has been compared to movies such as Norma Rae, Erin Brokovich and The Insider.

That's not to say that Dark Waters lacks atmosphere. The movie makes its case while capturing the bleak environs of a failing West Virginia farm and the grayness of Midwestern environments that have seen better days.

Basing the movie on a 2016 article that appeared in The New York Times Magazine, screenwriters Mario Correa and Matthew Michael Carnahan do a fine job capitalizing on the inherent drama of a tale involving betrayed trust.

The film reinforces a sobering conclusion: In the end, we can't rely on the government or on corporations for protection. We have to hope that people such as Bilott will take on fights that initially look futile.

Don't expect an explosive movie. Dark Waters gradually insinuates itself into consciousness in ways that make you shudder; it presents a clear case of a company that put its own interests ahead of the general good.

Childhood longing in 'Wonderstruck'

Director Todd Haynes takes on a serious structural challenge and sometimes meets it.

Based on a novel by Brian Selznick, Haynes's Wonderstruck tells parallel stories that evoke deeply human concerns, namely our ability to deal with loss and accept consolation. At its best, Wonderstruck showcases Haynes's ability to mix melancholy and nostalgia without succumbing to either. His movie can have the feeling of something dreamt.

One of Haynes's stories takes place in 1977 shortly after the death of a 12-year-old boy's mother. Once orphaned, Ben (Oakes Fegley) discovers a book called Wonderstruck among his late mother’s possessions. The book evidently was purchased at a New York City book store. A neatly placed bookmark suggests that Ben's father, a man the boy knows nothing about, gave the book to his mother (Michelle Williams in brief flashbacks).

Just as Ben dials the store to see if he can locate his dad, he's struck by lightning. As a result of the shock, Ben loses his hearing.

After a brief stay in the hospital in his home state of Minnesota, Ben sneaks away and hops a bus to New York City to continue the search for his father.

The movie's parallel story takes place in 1927 and involves a deaf 12-year-old girl (Millicent Simmonds) who, like Ben, heads for New York City. Simmonds' Rose tries to reunite with her mother, a star of silent films.

Cinematographer Ed Lachman shoots the 1977 segments in color; those in 1927 are shot in black and white.

While Haynes tries to get the feel of this parallel structure, the movie remains wobbly, but there’s little question that Wonderstruck aims to become a seriously lyrical helping of film. It succeeds in fits and starts.

Because much of the movie involves children, the child performers assume unusual importance. Simmonds, who’s actually deaf, acquits herself beautifully. But a lengthy scene in which Ben spends time with his new friend Jamie (Jaden Michael) in New York’s Museum of Natural History over-taxes both young actors and also stops the movie's flow.

When it’s working, we get hints of what Wonderstruck might have been: the 70s funk that Haynes finds in Manhattan’s streets; the melodramatic recreation of a silent film called Daughter of the Storm, and scenes in which Simmonds’ dazzled character arrives in New York City, having run away from Hoboken and a stern father (James Urbaniak) who clearly has no love for her.

Haynes couples a sense of childhood longing with notions about the importance of collecting items from the past, which explains why much of the movie takes place in museums. Toward the end, we even see a miniature model of New York City in a museum at the Queens, N.Y. site of the 1964 World’s Fair. The movie also includes a lengthy flashback that makes use of models and puppets to fill in some of the story's gaps.

Point of view shots that show us the world as seen but not heard by those who are deaf are intriguing, although they might have been even more effective had Haynes dropped Carter Burwell’s sometimes syrupy score.

Wonderstruck highlights its characters' need to acknowledge and get past painful loss without giving up on the mysterious wonder of existence.

Early on, young Ben reads a tone-setting Oscar Wilde quote his mother has pasted on her office wall. “We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.”
The idea that distant heavens lend awesome perspective to the shocking meagerness of our lives certainly carries weight, but in Wonderstruck the message can be more stated than felt. Enchantment is only half achieved.

Todd Haynes: Loving and hating the '50s

Cate Blanchett and Rooney Mara headline a story about two women who fall in love.

Carol -- the much-praised romance from director Todd Haynes -- carefully recreates the climate of the 1950s in which an affluent WASPy husband seems to care less about his wife's sexual orientation than about maintaining appearances.

Though never overly emphasized, the social issues in Carol allow the movie to bite into the rotten apple of repression that defined a post-war decade dominated by a rigorous commitment to conformity.

But Haynes' adaptation of The Price of Salt, a 1952 Patricia Highsmith novel, hardly qualifies as a fiery expression of outrage against 50s hypocrisy: It's a double-edged romance -- one between two women and the other between Haynes and the style of the '50s.

The most powerful figure in screenwriter Phyllis Nagy's screenplay -- at least at first blush -- is Carol (Cate Blanchett): Carol lives in an upper-middle class life in suburban New Jersey. She once had an affair with her best friend Abby (Sarah Paulson). She's well aware of her sexuality, but is languishing in a marriage that exists only on paper.

Although Carol's husband, Harge (Kyle Chandler) resents the affair, he seems willing to allow the trappings of class to mute his emotions -- at least when he's not too drunk to keep his anger and need in check.

Harge clings to Carol -- if not for love than to have someone take his arm when he attends a country club function.

Carol and Harge also have a daughter named Rindy (Kk Heim), a girl who figures into their struggle: Carol wants out of the marriage. Harge eventually threatens to keep her from her daughter.

But I get ahead of myself. The story's major event occurs early. While shopping in a Manhattan department store, Carol meets Therese (Rooney Mara), a young woman who's working the counter in the toy department. Carol instantly is attracted to this shop girl. It's clear that Mara's Therese feels something, as well.

Elegantly dressed, Blanchett's Carol exudes suburban superiority; for a movie in which desire plays an important role, it's interesting that Blanchett's Carol seems awfully calculating.

She leaves her gloves on Therese's counter, an obvious invitation for further contact. Later, she invites Therese to her home. She opens a door for this younger women (who wants to be a photographer), but doesn't push her through: She beckons Therese to enter.

I wondered whether Carol -- as a character -- would be possible without her fur coat, Olympian cheek bones and surface composure. If Carol lived in the South and things didn't go well for her, you could almost see her evolving into Blanche Dubois.

Rooney's performance is quieter, but she holds her own with a show of determined intensity. At the outset, Therese's life hovers in a kind of limbo: She has a boyfriend (Jake Lacy). He thinks they're on the verge of getting married. He's very wrong.

Things become clear to Lacy's Richard when Therese, who's only discovering her sexuality, agrees to take a cross-country car trip with Carol.

Carol's depressed about her inability to jettison Harge, who has spirited their daughter away. She's eager to feel free. Not surprisingly, it's on this trip that Carol and Therese first have sex -- in a motel in the town of Waterloo, Iowa.

Lots of emotion roils beneath the surface here, but Carol doesn't always take full advantage of its potential. The movie can be slow and intermittent in its ability to intrigue, but it builds as it goes. And Haynes finds a way (better not disclosed here) to give the movie's ending some kick.

Carol and Therese are two characters who don't necessarily live in the '50s; they live in a world that has been production designed, costumed and turned into a diorama: Carol can feel a bit airless.

And that may result from the conflict that animates Haynes' work: He seems to love the style of the '50s while chafing against the decade's constraints. It's weird in a way: The movie's volatile issues are bathed in the comforting nostalgia of its design, enhanced by cinematographer Ed Lachman's warmly conceived imagery.

Don't be surprised if production designer Judy Becker and costumer Sandy Powell carry home Oscar gold for their work on Carol, Haynes' second foray into the '50s after Far From Heaven (2002).

Love aside, Carol and Therese remain two very different women. They're from two different generations and two different social backgrounds. I won't say more, but I will tell you that I thought what happens to these women after Carol concludes might have made for an equally or even more interesting movie.