Friday Films: Away We Go

Inspired by Practicing Writing, I'm going to try something new: different themes for different days. I'll try my best to do a Friday post on some kind of movie or movie-related thing, and then maybe a Monday and a Wednesday. Maybe they'll be alliterative, but probably not. Friday will be, so here we go: the first edition of "Friday Films."

I'm a really big fan of Dave Eggers. I've liked everything he's done since "A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius." I don't know his wife, Vendela Vida's work as well, but the story I have read of hers, "Soleil," featured in The Book of Other People was good enough to make me want to seek out more of her writing. I also think Sam Mendes is a great director, so I was really excited to see the new movie "Away We Go," which Eggers and Vida wrote and Sam Mendes directed. It stars John Krasinski (Jim from "The Office") and Maya Rudolph (formerly of Saturday Night Live), and is a story about two individuals looking for a home. They're looking not only in the physical sense, but in what I guess you would call a spiritual sense, a place they belong, where they feel like they can do right by their unborn child. I read a few reviews of the movie which were less than kind, on Slate and in the Village Voice (that review was more of a personal attack on Dave Eggers than a real review, a personal attack that I don't think was well-deserved or fair to someone who seems, by all accounts, to really care about literature and fostering the written word), so I was nervous the movie would not live up to the stuff I've really loved, like "What is the What" and "How We Are Hungry." Luckily, I could not agree with those reviews less.

I like when a movie is unapologetically rooting for its main characters, despite their flaws and despite the fact that being sympathetic or sometimes sentimental is not always popular. I loved Pixar's "Up" for the exact same reason. So many movies are made, it seems, for little regard to the emotional core of their characters or their stories. They almost seem to believe they don't need those things, that visual effects or quirk alone will carry them along just fine. This is not to say that "Away We Go" did not have its fair share of "quirkiness": some of the supporting characters were a little over-the-top, but the moments that really resonated with me didn't have anything to do with those characters. What I was really invested in was the relationship between the main characters, and I think both actors, who are better-known for their comedic roles, went far beyond what I expected of them. There's a scene towards the end of the film where Maya Rudolph's character is telling a story about her childhood, and there was something so genuine about the dialogue and the way she spoke it that it really moved me.

There were a lot of funny moments in the movie, so I guess you could call it a romantic comedy. But it seems to be more in line with "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind," in that it is a romantic comedy that isn't afraid to explore darker themes and break out of the limits of that genre. It's a romantic comedy for grown-ups, even (maybe especially) if they happen to be grown-ups like myself, who are trying to find a place they belong, and are wondering how getting older and taking on new responsibilities will change them.