OK film fans, the day is Saturday, the hour is late, and I am your host for Procrastination Theater. For the last couple of weeks I've been in a funk, something just isn't quite right in my life and changes need to be made. But change is hard, whether it's in a relationship, your work or personal. Sometimes the hardest thing to do is to take a first step into darkness, into the unknown and believe in yourself and trust your instincts.
Entry Level is another small indie film with production quality that teeters on the "Lifetime Network" edge. But while the film making is pedestrian the story is apropos of our times of economic woe. It's sort of like the flip side of Oscar nominee Up in the Air; we get a look at the lives of the unemployed as they maneuver through the dread of searching for a new job. Clay (D.B. Sweeney from the "where are they now" files) is a talented chef who's 2nd restaurant has just gone under. To compound matters his girlfriend decides their relationship isn't "the one" and bails on him as he sits on the couch mocking Giada's cooking show. Clay decides that since he's pushing 40 he's had his fill of working in the food biz; he hated working for others and is depressed about the loss of chairs, tables and dishes that took him weeks to pick out and the foreclosure movers 30 minutes to take away. He decides it's time to find something more stable and get a corporate job.
However, with nearly 20 years spent working in a restaurants Clay has no "corporate" skill-set to speak of, meaning he is barely a candidate for even entry level work. After meeting with his unemployment counselor, who all but tells Clay he is wasting his time and should stick to the field he knows, Clay hits the circuit looking for a job with several other regulars who refer to themselves as the Unemployable Interviewees of America. Liz (Missi Pyle) spent her 20s and then some traveling the globe in the Peace Corp and has discovered her experience digging wells Bangladesh isn't a marketable skill stateside. Bob is a 64 year old former manufacturing engineer whose company went under taking his pension with it. He makes the rounds waiting to reach retirement age, too young for a Wal-Mart greeter and too old for an administrative assistant. Charlie (the epically sardonic actor/comedian Taylor Negron) was a corporate hiring manager who so hated his previous job he only hired interviewees he hated since he felt working for the company should be a form of punishment. Clay is also spurred along by the conspicuous wisdom of his homeless buddy Nick (the omnipresent Kurtwood Smith), who seems to understand the position Clay is in better than he does himself.
Clay and his fellow job seekers strive for some dignity and hope for success while suffering through interviews that are both pointless and humiliating. Before joining the ranks of the unemployed, Charlie, in the funniest scene in the film, interviews Clay for a job. Once they both agree to dismiss with the banalities we get the following exchange.
Charlie: You're about 40 years old, why would you ever want to get a job where you will have to take orders from a 28 year old ass wipe?
Clay: Cause it beats having no job at all.
Charlie: What do you base that on?
Now I realize this may not read as an earth-shakingly funny line, but if you knew me and my current situation you would understand why I not only found this line hilarious, but was able to identify with the core theme of this film. While not laugh out loud funny (no, I'm not using LOL), with the exception of some of the lines from Charlie (like this gem: "Each company is like a little suicide cult and their looking for the man who's already drinking their particular brand of kool aid"), it's a humorous and insightful look at finding a job in a culture that's instilled the ideology that you are your job. Ultimately, Clay's detour into the world of the Unemployable Interviewees of America is self-inflicted punishment. He has a gift, honed over the years through education, training and practice, which is evident to all who come in contact with it. In the end the best thing I can say is to quote Buddha, "Do not overrate what you have received, nor envy others. He who envies others does not achieve peace of mind." Tonight, my mind will be restless.
Showing posts with label Up in the Air. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Up in the Air. Show all posts
Saturday, February 27, 2010
Thursday, February 25, 2010
day 55 - Up in The Air
OK film fans, I realized today that we are rapidly approaching the Oscars and I am behind in checking out the cream of the crop for this year's nominations. I have one for you tonight, but how I got to it is a little unusual. This morning at work I was putting my lunch in the refrigerator and had a "polite conversation" with a woman from another department, the kind you have in the workplace with someone you see but don't know. As I hunted for a spot to put my lunch she mentioned that another department had 4 refrigerators to our measly 3. Then she wondered out loud if they really had that many more people in their department, especially after the "change" in staffing we had gone through. I made an offhanded remark about it always being an adventure and she replied, as if it was her personal mantra, "At least I still have a job." The way she said it stuck with me all day. The pain in her voice and the sigh afterward, it was like the worst thing she could imagine was not cancer or blindness or whatever, but actually losing her job. To be honest it kind of freaked me out. I could almost understand that kind of consumption if you were a Doctor or a Priest, a career that takes a special calling, but an office worker? I just couldn't make the connection. I understand needing a paycheck and I'm sure she had a mortgage, kids and the rest of The American Dream Luggage Set to contend with. Ultimately it speaks of a growing desperation in America, the kind you sense when The Dream is in danger of spinning out of control.
Up in the Air is the story of a man, Ryan Bingham (The Man, George Clooney) and his job. Because this is a comedy/drama for grownups, he is not a spy or a cop, a singer or an athlete, a CEO or a mogul. He is also not a mercenary, at least not the kind that kills people with a gun. He is a Termination Facilitator. When your company is "right-sizing" but doesn't have the balls to tell you face to face, they hire his employer, he flies in, he calmly tells you your presence is no longer needed, he handles your tantrum with grace and then flies off to the next city where he washes, rinses and repeats. With the economy in the shape it is now his business is booming. (And given the time it takes to green light, shoot and edit a film, this is an extraordinarily prescient film.) With his precious spare time Ryan speaks at self-help seminars about how and why to unpack the excess baggage of your life. He is not a swan, as he likes to state in his seminars, he is a shark. If he has a motto, and he seems to have a few, the best is this: the slower we move, the faster we die. Ryan Bingham moves so fast that nothing, not family, friends or lovers, can weigh him down.
George Clooney plays Ryan as a person who, like a spy, exists directly in front of you without you ever really knowing him. He's polite and friendly, he values his job and the service it provides (which is brutal but in his hands performed with dignity) but you would never know who he is. And this is exactly as Ryan has planned it; he has organized and compartmentalized his life down to a single suitcase and an empty apartment that he dreads spending 30 odd days a year in. This carefully crafted lifestyle comes into jeopardy in the form of two women.
The first is a fellow road warrior, Alex Goran (Vera Farmiga, an actress we need to see more of in big films), who shares not only his lifestyle but his attitude as well. They crisscross America, connecting whenever their flights land them in the same vicinity. Despite their casual relationship something about her starts to give Ryan thoughts he's not accustomed too. He even asks her to accompany him to his sister's wedding, visiting a family he's barely a part of. The second, Natalie Keener, is a recent Ivy League grad who has plans to bring the company into our high-tech modern era, firing people via video conferencing, thus ending Ryan's life in the clouds. The fact that Ryan might be grounded is a thought he cannot bear and he convinces his boss (Jason Bateman, continuing his career resurgence playing complete assholes) that she doesn't know the business. Unfortunately for Ryan his solution is for him to show her the ropes.
One of my favorite themes in the film is in how wunderkind Director Jason Reitman (son of the Legendary comedy Producer Ivan Reitman), in the words of my film shaman, "starts with the way corporations justify immoral behavior and then applies their rationalizations with perfect logic." In his last three films Reitman has successfully made intelligent satires about cigarettes companies, teenage pregnancy and now corporate layoffs. In each film these McGuffins are but pretext to the actual story of human convictions.
Up in the Air is about a common version of the modern man, a Peter Pan who has replaced human connection with a career. Ryan's life is spent in the clouds so he can soar over the entanglements that come with human connection. He has built his armor thick and created superb defense mechanisms. But life has a way of finding your weak spots, testing your limits and breaking you down to make you stronger. What Ryan isn't prepared for in life is exactly what life gives him. As Ryan repeatedly tells the inconsolable "right-sized" people sitting across from him, "Anybody who ever built an empire, or changed the world, sat where you are now. And it's because they sat there they were able to do it."
Up in the Air is the story of a man, Ryan Bingham (The Man, George Clooney) and his job. Because this is a comedy/drama for grownups, he is not a spy or a cop, a singer or an athlete, a CEO or a mogul. He is also not a mercenary, at least not the kind that kills people with a gun. He is a Termination Facilitator. When your company is "right-sizing" but doesn't have the balls to tell you face to face, they hire his employer, he flies in, he calmly tells you your presence is no longer needed, he handles your tantrum with grace and then flies off to the next city where he washes, rinses and repeats. With the economy in the shape it is now his business is booming. (And given the time it takes to green light, shoot and edit a film, this is an extraordinarily prescient film.) With his precious spare time Ryan speaks at self-help seminars about how and why to unpack the excess baggage of your life. He is not a swan, as he likes to state in his seminars, he is a shark. If he has a motto, and he seems to have a few, the best is this: the slower we move, the faster we die. Ryan Bingham moves so fast that nothing, not family, friends or lovers, can weigh him down.
George Clooney plays Ryan as a person who, like a spy, exists directly in front of you without you ever really knowing him. He's polite and friendly, he values his job and the service it provides (which is brutal but in his hands performed with dignity) but you would never know who he is. And this is exactly as Ryan has planned it; he has organized and compartmentalized his life down to a single suitcase and an empty apartment that he dreads spending 30 odd days a year in. This carefully crafted lifestyle comes into jeopardy in the form of two women.
The first is a fellow road warrior, Alex Goran (Vera Farmiga, an actress we need to see more of in big films), who shares not only his lifestyle but his attitude as well. They crisscross America, connecting whenever their flights land them in the same vicinity. Despite their casual relationship something about her starts to give Ryan thoughts he's not accustomed too. He even asks her to accompany him to his sister's wedding, visiting a family he's barely a part of. The second, Natalie Keener, is a recent Ivy League grad who has plans to bring the company into our high-tech modern era, firing people via video conferencing, thus ending Ryan's life in the clouds. The fact that Ryan might be grounded is a thought he cannot bear and he convinces his boss (Jason Bateman, continuing his career resurgence playing complete assholes) that she doesn't know the business. Unfortunately for Ryan his solution is for him to show her the ropes.
One of my favorite themes in the film is in how wunderkind Director Jason Reitman (son of the Legendary comedy Producer Ivan Reitman), in the words of my film shaman, "starts with the way corporations justify immoral behavior and then applies their rationalizations with perfect logic." In his last three films Reitman has successfully made intelligent satires about cigarettes companies, teenage pregnancy and now corporate layoffs. In each film these McGuffins are but pretext to the actual story of human convictions.
Up in the Air is about a common version of the modern man, a Peter Pan who has replaced human connection with a career. Ryan's life is spent in the clouds so he can soar over the entanglements that come with human connection. He has built his armor thick and created superb defense mechanisms. But life has a way of finding your weak spots, testing your limits and breaking you down to make you stronger. What Ryan isn't prepared for in life is exactly what life gives him. As Ryan repeatedly tells the inconsolable "right-sized" people sitting across from him, "Anybody who ever built an empire, or changed the world, sat where you are now. And it's because they sat there they were able to do it."
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)