Wonder Wheel (2017)

Really Surprised!

Best movie of this year hands down!

Am I Missing Something?

Great example of an old-fashioned, pure-at-heart escapist event movie that doesn't pretend to be anything that it's not and has boat loads of fun being its own ludicrous self.

Kate Winslet carries the movie with an impeccable performance, going from hope and being in love to anger, jealousy and frustration. And she definitely takes us with her.The story is simple and opens plenty room for the characters and relations to develop. Pace is good and the dialogues are clever, as expected.Justin Timberlake did a good job and for the first time I forgot my prejudice against him. Juno temple was great. The only real misfit or miscast was Jim Belushi. Something about his act seemed unnatural.

Allusions to O'Neill and Hamlet, the mood of inevitable tragedy, well acted and well presented. A worthy evening's entertainment.

No one has been treading water and barely keeping his head above it like Woody Allen's film career. The one time giant of cinema in generous terms is hitting about 200 over his last 20 films as he fields superstars and hires the best lensmen and offers up impeccable set design and costuming. His writing however has become a threadbare transparency of past films, the dialogue lacking the wit and humor, found in his prime, nowhere to be found lately.Wonder Wheel is a glum Radio Days about an adulterous affair between a Coney Island lifeguard (Justin Timberlake) and a waitress (Kate Winslet) married to a carousel operator (Jim Belushi) living next to The Wonder Wheel. Matters get complicated when a prodigal daughter by another wife shows up at their place with the mob in pursuit. Things calm briefly but explode when the daughter begins to date the lifeguard. Winslet does the best she can with Allen's meager script that seems to repeat itself in the chaotic slap happy domicile scenes that come across both sloppy and artificial. With a convincing accent and weary facade it would be the equal of oscar winner Blanchette with healthier dialogue. The limited Belushi with Allen's help comes across whiny and annoying while lifeguard Timberlake's cavalier attitude in the face of tragedy fails to endear him as well. Juno Temple as the hon on the run and a leitmotif of a firebug son also appear as Allen ghosts from the past.Cinematographer Storaro works his usual wondrous magic but the cast he showcases remains stranded with Allen's anemic script and Wonder Wheel barely turns because of it.

The stylisms of this movie are clear; the lighting the limited sets. It is like a theatre play, which of course is the whole point. Theatre itself is an important theme in this movie, hence why three of the four characters (everyone else is window dressing) are actors or writers.Yet the power of the characterisations and acting helps communicate the complexities of emotion, despite all its surface level appearances. It seems like any other Woody Allen movie, when Timberlake's character talks to the camera, and we assume everything will be light and comedic and there will be some adulterous hi jinx, which there is, but underneath the shiny surface are a couple of deeply frustrated artists, two characters with such shifting and complex emotions. Of course, Winslet's character has the limelight, and the complexity there... well, when the final act swings in, Timberlake is no longer talking to the camera and it reaches a different plain. Is it a plot twist (albeit an expected one) for the sake of it, or is the bored housewife desperate to be in a true drama (dressed all up in her Shakespearian costume), and thus creates one.