One of the first movies to be entirely written, directed and edited during the COVID 19 pandemic, Malcolm & Marie is being made out to be quite a unique beast, but in all honesty it’s not unlike any stage to film play adaptation that we have seen before – the only major difference being that the minimal cast and limited sets are not a product of source material, but rather a product of budget and pandemic problematics. The meme was made almost immediately of ranking this amongst other movies of “straight people screaming at each other for two hours”, and where I found the joke funny, I did find myself noting almost immediately what separates those films from this one, for this film does have a lot going for it, but also fails to have much of the substance or power of the films that is being equated to, chiefly Marriage Story and Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? Although it’s just a meme, it does bring certain arguments of quality to light when it comes to looking at this COVID product.
I don’t feel like I need to talk about the COVID restrictions that birthed the film, neither in a positive or negative manner, for I really don’t think that one could tell if one didn’t know the surrounding context of the film’s production. The film is written and directed by Sam Levinson and pairs him once more with his seeming muse, Zendaya, following their rapturously acclaimed television effort Euphoria, for which I have yet to take part in. Levinson has placed his two characters returning home from the premiere of titular Malcolm’s new movie, with his partner the titular Marie rather infuriated by the lack of “thanks” she received in his speech prior to the screening. As one would expect or at least hope in a movie of two hours length, tensions arise and this happy couple quickly begin to divulge secret after secret and revelation after... You know where it’s going, we’ve seen it all before. The film has received a pretty divided critical opinion and Levinson has immediately jumped to making excuses through the use of the COVID argument, although as again aforementioned I do believe one would struggle to notice if they didn’t have the knowledge. The film does scream ‘pretentious’, but I do hope that some of that’s intentional, it does seem to be in parts with its constant verbal dismantling of critical opinion on the exact sort of intimate character drama following people of colour that we are in fact watching. However I feel many critics have sided with the opinion that at points the film does frequently read as false, an opinion I share myself. Levinson does direct with flare and a constant developing rhythm to keep the film flowing and dynamic, I do have to say that when watching the film I was never really bored. However Levinson’s clear talents in directing, which are bolstered by the stunning black and white cinematography of Marcell Rev and the wonderfully subtle editing of Julio Perez IV, do not balance in regard to quality with his writing capabilities. The script itself is entertaining and depthful and does offer its two leads more than enough juicy monologues to deliver, however it does repeatedly just ring false. I do have to say however that the flaws of the script are more visible through Zendaya’s performance than Washington’s, with Washington’s performance being the undoubtedly stronger of the two in my opinion. All leading me to believe that the script was perhaps better on paper, than in performance. Or at least with these performances.
Our eponymous Malcolm and Marie are played by Zendaya and John David Washington and I must now comment that as I have not got on the Euphoria train, I have really not been wowed by a Zendaya performance at all yet, whereas Washington has impressed me on multiple occasions. I do have to say that this is certainly the best work I have seen from Zendaya, but also doesn’t wholly sell me on the hype. Zendaya’s performance as Marie frequently relies on a blankness that doesn’t really come off as subtle, just... blank. The only reason for me that her performance works in the slightest is that it is so clearly narrativley juxtaposing the wildly bombastic nature of Washington’s Malcolm. For me there is such a fine line between intentional and powerful subtlety and desperately plain subtlety, I have to comment that I felt Zendaya’s performance sided with the latter. I just felt a distinct lack of dimensions to her character, as she repeatedly flitted between morose and delicate, thus making her sudden changes to anger or overt sexuality feel a little removed from the reality that has been built up. One particular moment regarding an audition rings untrue immediately and completely made that entire moment have no weight or power to me at all. Washington however as I say was greatly entertaining and invigorating with power and realism in almost every moment, even when given some borderline outrageously convoluted monologues to deliver. The chemistry between the two of them is very good however and makes the film work in a way that would be impossible if that chemistry wasn’t there. Ultimately though the ending of the film too felt distinctly anti-climatic and one that really did not justify the length of time or amount of passion and energy we have viewed being exerted - All in all a pretty ham-fisted way of saying that I felt the ending fell very flatly.
A dynamic and viscerally delivered 6/10, with some desperately intriguing and entertaining stretches, padded out by certain narrative leaps to get to the next mic drop moment. Many of these mic’s drop effectively, but some do drop with a flat thud – the issue is of course that Levinson, Zendaya and Washington clearly believe that every revelation is an earthquake. Some are. But some just make rather tepid shakes.
P.S. There is of course also the ‘inside baseball’ factor that all of the arguments about film and critics meant something to me as I understood every reference – I comment in the least pretentious way I can. Whereas I commented in my Mank review, that I feel that one could still get a tremendous lot out of it, even if Citizen Kane had not been viewed. I really do feel that if the viewer here doesn’t have a good grasp on the current landscape of film coming from the Black community, then many long stretches of dialogue may come off as completely uninteresting or largely pretentious, as I have seen many audience reviews already site the film as being.
- - Thomas Carruthers
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