Rated PG-13 for adult content, sexuality and mild violence and profanity
OTHER TITLES: WAITRESS: HOW TO LIVE A TASTY LIFE (Title in Japan); Jennas Kuchen - Für Liebe gibt es kein Rezept (German for: JENNA'S PIES: THERE'S NO RECIPE FOR LOVE); Pincérlány - Édesen is csípős (Hungarian for WAITRESS: BITTER AND SWEET); GARCONETE (title in Brasil); Amor aos Pedaços (title in Portugal for LOVE TO PIECES); GARCONETE: RECETAS DE AMOR (title in Brasil for WAITRESS: RECIPES OF LOVE)
WARNING: SPOILERS...IF YOU HAVEN'T SEEN THE FILM YET, PLEASE DO NOT READ MY REVIEW!!!
I almost didn't go to last night's screening on account of being really sick. I kept telling myself, "There will surely be other screenings. It's becoming a sleeper hit. Surely it will open wider soon and I'll have zillions of chances to see it."
But I didn't want to go to other screenings. I wanted to go to THAT one. I had my ticket, and I wanted to go.
I'm so glad I did.
Let me start with this: WAITRESS isn't some simple chick flick. No way. It is not even a "flaky, fluffy" comedy, as many have described it. That is not the kind of pie it is.
It is rather a pie so heavy and so rich and so complex that its recipe is impossibly long, with many layers and textures to savor, many flavors to test.
It left me almost dizzy with multiple emotions. I was happy, I was sad, I was in tears, I was giggling, I was a little angry and regretful. What a masterpiece!
There is no doubt that WAITRESS is a comedy. There were some scenes that had everyone in the audience howling. But there is some heavy, dark content that was not easy to see. Yet it was so necessary.
If a reviewer is honest with themselves, they will identify or at least empathize with ALL of the characters. I've read a few reviews condemning the adultery. I've read a few that accuse the film of "glamorizing" domestic violence. And, damned if I didn't read one review that described Jenna as "the bad wife who refused to have sex with her husband and who cheated on him". (Had to be from a fundamentalist Christian source, though I really didn't bother to look).
This film DOES NOT glamorize, nor does it preach condemnation. This film is simply and brilliantly a human story, about people living their lives, having their dilemmas, dealing with their problems in ways that potentially could cause even MORE problems. Some of the people will learn from their errors, and some will not. There are no easy solutions, and there is no PRETTY WOMAN ending. To have that kind of ending would have been an insult.
Jenna (Keri Russell) is our main character, a young waitress working in a folksy pie shoppe somewhere in, perhaps Arkansas, Oklahoma, Texas, Georgia?
She is a strikingly pretty little thing, in her little blue uniform, and she manages a sweet smile for her customers even though she has very little to smile about these days. She has just discovered she is pregnant, and she is anything but happy. Her two gal pals Becky (Cheryl Hines) and Dawn (Adrienne Shelly) do their best to comfort Jenna, but this new development in Jenna's life has completely rearranged her picture of her future.
Even the owner of the pie shoppe, surly old Joe (Andy Griffith) cannot dispel the growing (excuse the pun) resentment, fear and misery Jenna is facing.
Jenna is a prisoner. Have no doubts, folks. She is a prisoner. She is being oppressed, abused, and imprisoned. And human beings cannot tolerate this kind of state very long without doing drastic things, like managing to make an escape, killing their oppressor, or willing themselves to die. For now, in spite of the horrible roadblock that has been placed in front of her, Jenna's spirit remains as strong as it can be. She is surviving, but how long can she take this? By "this" I mean Earl, and there is more about Earl in a couple of paragraphs.
Like any tormented artist, Jenna escapes her world of sadness, fear and lonliness by creating. Only she is not a painter or a sculptor or a photographer. She is a baker. She creates pies, lucious, unique pies, with unique names, made from things nobody else would have thought to whip together. And like any artist, she loves her creations. Even when she is not actively creating, she is creating in her head. Making pies is the only thing left in this world that gives her any pleasure.
Until she meets her new gynocologist, Dr. Pomatter (Nathan Fillion), a handsome, kind-hearted newcomer to town who has the kind of shy clumsiness that is so magnetically sexy that Jenna can't help but be drawn helplessly to him, and he to her. Their affair is scorchingly hot, a source of orgasmic joy for both of them, an escape from Jenna's miserable existence, an escape from Dr. Pomatter's reality. It's easy to ask, why would he be unfaithful when he has such a lovely, wonderful wife, and yes, she is indeed a doll. It would have been so common and so easy to paint Dr. Pomatter's spouse as a bitch or a cold fish or a domineering, nagging twit or something, but Shelly won't let things be so simple.
The fact is, Jenna and Dr. Pomatter are human beings. Things happen. People do things to cope, and those things aren't always the right things to do.
Jenna's reason for being so miserable, her nemesis is her own husband Earl (Jeremy Sisto). One could easily describe him as one rotten son-of-a-bitch, loser, prick, dickhead, sorry motherfucking bully asshole. He made me so mad! He won't let Jenna have a car, won't let her go anywhere, won't let her do anything. When he gets mad, he throws childish tantrums, bellyaches like he's her first baby, and even slaps her on occasion. Yeah he's a real piece of work, this Early. Someone you'd love to see killed or better yet, maimed by a mack truck.
And yet, because of Shelly's skillful storytelling, Earl is maddeningly human too. You have to face, like it or not, that something drives his actions. Fear, insecurity, anger, whatever. Those sound like cliches even to this reviewer, and yet Sisto and Shelly work together to bring us an utterly pathetic, sad guy who doesn't realize that the more you tighten your grip, the more you end up losing. The performance is so beautifully convincing that for a while I almost liked Earl. He almost becomes a sweet, likeable guy during the first moments of fatherhood. But it is too little, too late, for Jenna. I found myself so fooled that for a bit, I was criticizing, "I wish they would have gone into more about the aftermath of Jenna finally telling Earl that the marriage was over." I wanted to see something like, Gee, does fatherhood vanquish Earl's selfishness? Does he get to have any contact with the baby? IS THERE ANY HOPE FOR HIM?
Sadly, I already had my answer, and it is NO. Earl is clearly a disturbed man, a control freak who felt so low about himself that the only way to elevate that feeling was to control, manipulate and bully his wife. He was abusive, and as one wise friend has said, you don't need to have bruises and welts to be an abused person. He was killing her, snuffing out her will to live. And the abuse would have escalated, as it always does. Sooner or later, Earl would have killed Jenna, Jenna would have killed herself (baby or no baby) or Jenna would have killed Earl. She probably did Earl, as well as herself and the baby, a favor. It's sad that Jenna was so afraid and so sick of Earl by this point that she had to do what she did, but you know as well as I do that he didn't think he was doing anything wrong.
The film has a few side plots to lighten things a bit, and they are wonderfully human as well. Dawn, who seems to be a very lonely individual, ends up falling in love and marrying a quirky guy named Ogie (Eddie Jemison), who brings flowers and bad poetry as he comes courtin'. An even better side plot is the affair that Becky has with the grumpy cook Cal (Lew Temple), because she, like Jenna, is trying to cope with an unsavory reality: a sick, incapacitated husband.
Again, I say, people do things to escape. I don't judge or condemn. Rather, I feel relieved, and applaud Adrienne Shelly for having the courage to give us characters that, if we're honest, we identify with, not sit in judgement of. Forget what the Bible teaches, forget "morality" and be honest. Who wouldn't want to have a hot, joyous affair to escape the misery of changing adult diapers, or being figuratively chained to a husband who has been so awful that he has smothered and destroyed every bit of attraction or love you ever had for him?
Did I not say this film was complex? Yes it is. It's brilliant, beautiful, poignant, hilarious, sad, maddening. I hope it wins awards. It deserves to, for everything from the color pallette of warms and pastels to the wonderful cast and performances. I think to wish the actors to win Oscars is a delicate matter, as most actors who win an Oscar go on to do the worst movies in Hollywood history, yet I can't lie when I say that the acting performances, especially those of Russell, Fillion, Sisto and Griffith (he is an absolute jewel here), are very deserving. Oh crap, even Hines, Temple, Jemison and Shelly deserve kudos. Everyone did a great job.
And for those big studios that make "big" romantic comedies like A LOT LIKE LOVE, take a lesson. It IS possible to make a comedy where even the most minor of supporting roles can make an impact. Case in point: Lew Temple's moment with Jenna.
Another huge amount of praise needs to be heaped on Shelly's realistic treatment of Jenna's attitude about her pregnancy. Contrary to popular belief, pregnancy and motherhood is not in every woman's life plan. It is NOT always a happy occasion, especially not when you have the kind of husband Jenna has. Once that situation is resolved in Jenna's mind, she suddenly falls in love with her new child. And it turns out she is NOT a child hater or a mean bitch. She seemed angry with the baby, but we know she was really angry at Earl.
What can I say about the ending? Well, aside from the fact that you really need to have a box of Kleenex with you I can safely say that Jenna and her little daughter, whom she names Lulu, will have happy lives, thanks to someone's unforeseen generosity, and Jenna's dreams do come true.
Even though the tragic death of Adrienne Shelly did not concretely surface as I relished her final film, somehow a subtle yet huge sadness gripped my heart as the credits rolled. I could go totally overboard and describe it as a spirit or a presence in the theatre, but it was definitely a warm, heavy, sad feeling, a kind of fullness that you don't get from eating too much pie. Even now, just thinking about that ending, I am tearing up.
For the record, WAITRESS is a superb film achievement and I am giving it an A+. Sorry for such a long-winded commentary, but there could have been even more...this film is that complex and thought-provoking.
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