Silver Linings Playbook
Mental illness really isn’t a laughing matter, but that may be why the laughs, fittingly, stick in the throat watching David O. Russell’s sly dramatic comedy. Adapting the novel by Matthew Quick, the writer-director has made a film that plays to both an older audience that led to his Oscar success with “The Fighter,” but also captures the subversive wit in his early films, from his Sundance debut, “Spanking the Monkey,” to “Flirting With Disaster,” “Three Kings,” and “I Heart Huckabees.” It takes quite a talent to pull that type of high-wire act off; thankfully, Russell has some help in front of the camera.
Having finally seen both of them after months of buzz following the film’s debut at Toronto, I can honestly say that it’d be a major surprise if either Bradley Cooper or Jennifer Lawrence are left out of the final five for Best Actor and Best Actress, respectively. Of course, Lawrence was already on MY radar courtesy of “The Hunger Games,” but Cooper is a major surprise. Yes, he’s impressed to a certain degree in films like “Limitless,” “The Hangover,” and the Fall’s rather flat, “The Words,” but the actor hits all the right notes as Pat, a young man who just got out of a mental hospital after breaking down, and getting violent, after catching his wife cheating on him with a colleague from work. His wife has gotten a restraining order against him, so it’s surprising how good of a mood he’s in. His attitude makes more sense when we learn that a) he has bipolar disorder, and b) he’s genuinely exciting about the progress he’s made thus far, allowing his mother (Jacki Weaver) to convince the court to let him out after eight months. It’s not an easy transition, though, and his parents (including his father, played by Robert DeNiro in his best role in over a decade) have a difficult time getting through to him with regards to the changes that have happened. Maybe a fresh start, so that he stops obsessing over his wife, Nikki?
Enter Tiffany, Lawrence’s character. A widower whose cop husband was killed, Tiffany isn’t necessarily all together herself. She was fired from her job after sleeping with everyone in the office, and she’s typically called a slut. She agrees, however, and acknowledges her own emotional troubles. More importantly, she accepts them as a part of who she is. As someone whose dealt with their own mental illness, this is an important part of healing, and despite her seemingly “crazy” demeanor, Tiffany seems relatively healthy with who she is. More so than Pat, at least. They meet at a dinner party hosted by Tiffany’s sister, though the intention is, very obviously, a set up, and Tiffany and Pat seem to take it from there. Pat, however, isn’t biting on Tiffany’s bait (so to speak), and is focused more on Nikki. Tiffany persists, though, and a quid pro quo deal with Pat leads to them teaming up for a dance competition, bringing them closer.
One of the most fascinating aspects of “Silver Linings Playbook” is how, in their own ways, Pat and Tiffany deal with their illnesses and anxieties. Both have found ways to emulate happiness, or at least, understand what that could be, but it comes from differing behaviors. Pat is one of those people that doesn’t really hold anything back; he’s brutally honest with people regardless of whichever mood he’s in, although when his bipolar self comes out, it’s a difficult sight– he can’t control his emotions, he gets violent with himself, and it leads to some tense scenes when it happens late at night. Tiffany, however, buries her feelings, and represses them until outside events trigger an outburst. This is never more true than at the competition at the end, when the surprise appearance of someone leads her down a path of potential self-destruction. It’s a painful moment, and almost ruins all of the collective work done by both her and Pat, but leads to a moment that ends up being moviewatching bliss, on the way to a “happy ending.”
My focus on Cooper and Lawrence in this review may be making it seem as though “Silver Linings Playbook” is a two-person show, but that couldn’t be less true. Apart from a strong supporting cast that includes not just Weaver and DeNiro but also Chris Tucker (in his first non-“Rush Hour” role since “Jackie Brown”) and Julia Stiles as Tiffany’s sister, there’s also Russell, who delivers a film that’s all heart and humor while looking at two individuals who are trying to deal with tough moments in their past, and unfortunately, are on the outside of society when their troubled psyches come to the surface. While I would hardly call it one of my major-league “favorite” films of the year, I did respond to it stronger than I think a lot of people will. Most will probably just find it an entertaining dramatic-comedy, but for anyone who’s dealt with mental illness, whether in their life, or when it comes to others in their life, I have a feeling it will hit a little bit closer to home. Either way, people are in for a wild ride.
