Most
of Lewis’ performance is worth watching, even if Max Rose is grossly sentimental. You may not find a better
performance in a worse movie this year, or next year. Max Rose wants so badly to hit our heartstrings with bromides about
aging and death and love, but it trips over its own good intentions. If only
the movie had relaxed a little, as Lewis does in his performance, it might’ve
succeeded. Instead, it wants to hit us over the head and remind us that this is
sad stuff we’re watching, that life is filled with melancholy, and in the end
we all croak, so we’d better start being nice to each other. The movie is like
a big hug from an unpleasant and dull family member.
In
the beginning, we see Rose and his
family outside a hospital where his wife of 67 years has just died. We see him alone, wandering around their big
old house, struggling with can openers.
Then he finds a series of clues that lead him to believe his wife once
had an affair, decades ago, and he begins to crumble at the thought of such a
thing. He drives his son (Kevin Pollak) and granddaughter (Kerry Bishé) batty with his anger, and when he seems to
be losing touch with reality, they ship him to an assisted living community. He
amuses himself by making potholders and reading Sue Grafton novels, but the
affair claws at him; through a series of unlikely circumstances, he’s able to
meet the man who may have had a fling with his wife. But all ends well.
Writer/director Daniel Noah wouldn’t send us away without making everyone happy.
We’ve
seen this movie before in various forms, and we know it by heart. To Noah’s
credit, he allows Lewis to walk the landscape of the story in his own sweet
time, and as has been his case since the 1940s, Lewis’ timing is flawless. And
though his clown’s face has aged, Lewis can still, with just a slight downturn
of an eye, indicate a world of sorrow.
Lewis
also manages to muscle his way through the flashback scenes, where we see him
with his late wife (Claire Bloom); he even makes those scenes palatable. When she reads to him
from a biography of Eleanor Roosevelt, he looks at her with awe, with love; he
conjures up feelings and shows them without saying a word. Actors of greater
renown would fail at this very thing.
The
rest of the cast, unfortunately, appear to be acting in a television sitcom.
An
exception is Dean Stockwell as the man who tried to steal Rose’s wife. He gives
his role hell, but even he’s a cliché; he’s an old Hollywood player, bedridden,
surrounded by awards and mementoes, wearing himself out with epic coughing
jags. A movie where Lewis and Stockwell went toe-to-toe for 90 minutes might’ve
been interesting. Who knows what those two veterans would’ve pulled out?
The
movie, apparently, has been kicking around for a few years; it appeared at Cannes
in 2013 to an indifferent reception, and has been retooled for this 2016 release. Prior
to that, it took Noah some time to finance the project. Lewis signed on early
and stayed with it. Did he deserve better? Perhaps. But no one else has been
willing to use Lewis in recent years, and this, perhaps, gives us one last
glimpse of him.
He
has several moments where he steals the movie and shoves it into his pocket for
a second. My favorite was when he was at the seniors’ home, sitting through an agonizing
Sunday afternoon with his son and granddaughter. Then, as if to break up the monotony, he reveals the
potholders he’s made in a crafts class. “Look what I made,” he says, displaying
them seemingly out of thin air. “They’re shaped like kidneys.” The moment is
loaded: he’s playing the slightly addled grandpa who has given in to his
surroundings, but he’s still Jerry Lewis; the timing, always the timing, is
impeccable.
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