Wander Darkly
The big twist in “Wander Darkly” is fairly predictable, when you come to think about it afterwards. For 97 minutes, writer-director Tara Miele has told her story in a way that has us imagining a specific reality; the twist doesn’t negate that reality, however, but simply reveals the truth behind it. It’s an anxiety nightmare about loss, grief and responsibility, and it’s effective in engaging us in grappling with those ideas.
Matteo (Diego Luna) and Adrienne (Sienna Miller) are new parents, and they are still trying to figure out life as parents. Matteo seems to be distant from the responsibilities, and Adrienne seems stressed out by having many of them thrust on to her. They’re struggling financially, relying a lot on her parents, and they have a dinner to attend tonight, but Adrienne finds Matteo doing his woodworking. They go to the dinner, but they are arguing. They continue to argue on the way home when they get into a car accident, which where Adrienne dies. But, her spirit is still living, and she finds herself able to interact with Matteo, sending her on an emotional journey that will change both of them moving forward.
I honestly do love movies about grief and emotional journeys. I guess you could say I’m a glutton for punishment in one way, but I remember my most formative emotional journeys vividly, and how I came out on the other end a different person. In that way, “Wander Darkly” is absolutely up my ally, and Miele has crafted an emotional one here. If we were able to communicate with people who have passed, how would that go? What would it be like for them to see their own funeral, or how their loved ones are coping? And if there were unresolved issues, could you go back in time, to key moments that led to some of those issues, and explain your thinking to your loved ones? These are some of the things we see in “Wander Darkly,” and I love that the film is not afraid to open up these “what if?” scenarios.
The performances by Miller and Luna are critical to the film’s success, and they deliver. Miller captures Adrienne’s anxiety and uncertainty effortlessly, and Luna gets Matteo’s seeming distance correct, as well as his compassion and love for Adrienne, and what she’s going through. It makes the reality of what’s happening in the film work all the stronger. If it didn’t, the movie would feel empty, and it doesn’t. In a year where life and death is on a lot of minds, “Wander Darkly” is a good cinematic way of wrestling with those concepts.
