Skip to main content

Film Review: "Wonder Wheel"

Related image
Kate Winslet, Justin Timberlake, Juno Temple and Jim Belushi star in Woody Allen's new drama, Wonder Wheel. The film takes place in 1950s Coney Island and centers around Ginny (Winslet), a waitress that is unhappily married to Humpty, a carousel operator (Belushi). When Ginny falls for a young lifeguard (Timberlake), she begins to find happiness again. When Humpty's estranged daughter shows up and also vies for Mickey's attention, however, Ginny's life begins to unravel.
At this moment, I'd like to point out that I've never seen a Woody Allen movie that I actually liked. Movies like Annie Hall, Sleepers and Play It Again, Sam are, in my opinion, absolutely dreadful. Needless to say that going into Wonder Wheel, my expectations were about as low as they possibly could have been. For the most part, I was correct in expecting a dull film, but that's not to say that there weren't any redeemable qualities in it.
The best part about Wonder Wheel is that it has some very strong performances, with Kate Winslet standing out high above her co-stars. Her character has this sort of slow descent into madness that Winslet is able to portray wonderfully. Jim Belushi is also surprisingly good and gives depth to a character that could have easily been very one-dimensional. Some of the other characters had some serious issues, however. I think Justin Timberlake was seriously miscast for this role. At no point in this film did I actually believe he was the character he was trying to be. There is also a storyline with Ginny's pyromaniacal son, Richie, that is completely pointless and didn't need to be there at all.
Visually speaking, this film also uses its setting very well. Having 1950s Coney Island as the backdrop for this story provides a wonderful array of colors and lights that make this a gorgeous movie to look at. What's frustrating about this is that Wonder Wheel fails to use this vibrant setting to enhance the actual story. In a movie that deals so much with love and romance, you should take full advantage of these amazing visuals that are available to you. Yet for whatever reasons, all of these love scenes take place while tucked away in the dark. You would never imagine that a movie that looks so warm and full of life would actually turn out as dull and boring as this movie was.
           As a whole, Wonder Wheel is not a good film. At times it feels like a play and at times it feels like a movie, but it never seems to figure out which one it actually wants to be. None of the characters are actually likable or easy to root for. This isn't a film that I could really recommend anyone to see. As far as scores go, I'd put this at around 30%.


Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Classic Movie Monday: How "Casablanca" Influenced "Wonder Woman"

Before the release of Wonder Woman, director Patty Jenkins spoke to Fandango about her influences for the film. She mentioned the 1942 classic, Casablanca , and said, “I wanted a great love story where both characters have integrity and it might be set in the complexities of war, but it turns into a grand love story.” At first, I wasn’t quite sure how much Casablanca really factored into Wonder Woman . After all, these are two vastly different films. As I re-watched Casablanca, however, I began to notice similarities between the two that I had never considered. So, as I move forward with this article, I will talk about how Casablanca influenced Wonder Woman . More specifically, how it helped Wonder Woman become a great love story in a genre where great love stories are far and few in between. I want to start off by talking about the characters and draw some parallels between the leads in both films. While watching Casablanca , I couldn’t help but compare Humphrey Bogart’s char...
Post a Comment
Read more

Guillermo del Toro: The Man Behind the Monsters

"Since childhood, I've been faithful to monsters. I have been saved and absolved by them. Because monsters, I believe, are patron saints of our blissful imperfection. They allow and embody the possibility of failing and living." Those were the words that Guillermo del Toro spoke after winning his first Golden Globe for his directorial work on The Shape of Water . It was a speech that I connected with and understood completely. With the Oscars coming up, I want to say a few words on what Guillermo del Toro and his films mean to me and why I am rooting for him to win the Best Director award at the Academy Awards.              Growing up, my parents never really censored what my brothers and I saw on TV or at the movies. As a result, I was exposed to many of the great horror films at an extremely young age. Slashers were a constant in our home. Despite how much they scared me, they also fascinated me. Slashers were the norm for...
Post a Comment
Read more

Best Films of 2017

2017 has been a ridiculously good year for film. The amount of legitimately great movies we got is outstanding, but it also made this list extremely difficult to make. There are so many films I genuinely thought deserved to be on my list and having to pick which ones were going to be left out was harder than I thought it would be. I would like to point out that these films are on my list because of how they made me feel, and not necessarily just because of how well-made they are. So, without further ado, here are my top 15 best films of 2017! Honorable Mentions: The Shape of Water, The Disaster Artist, The Babysitter, Gerald's Game, Battle of the Sexes, I Tonya, Thor: Ragnarok and Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2. 15. Wonder Woman, dir. Patty Jenkins Wonder Woman  has to be looked at as one of the most important superhero films we've ever had. It came out in a year where the female voice was louder and clearer than it has ever been. There has never been a female-led supe...
Post a Comment
Read more