I Heart Huckabees
Fox Searchlight
Starring: Mark Wahlberg, Naomi Watts, Jude Law, Dustin Hoffman and Lily Tomlin
The Verdict: Who can help but “heart” this movie, even in spite of some of it’s messy points?
3 out of 4 stars
Albert, like so many of us, has a few problems understanding his own existence.
An environmentalist by trade, Albert (Jason Schwartzman) spends his days combating the ecologically-damaging practices of the ubiquitous Huckabees Corporation and writing poems celebrating the grandeur of nature (“Nobody sits like this rock sits. You ROCK, rock.”).
But Huckabees is winning, the local wetlands are getting slowly eradicated and every positive step Albert makes seems overshadowed by the successes of Brad Stand (Jude Law), a rising star in Huckabees Corporation with enough ambition and soulless pretty-boy charm to upstage the dour, shaggy Albert at any business meeting.
When a series of coincidences with a tall young African doorman (don’t ask) finally drive him to a breaking point, Albert decides it’s time to figure out his life from the inside out. But what can he do? Where can he turn?
In the off-kilter universe of “I Heart Huckabees,” he turns to Bernard and Vivian Jaffe, a husband-wife team of skilled “existential detectives.” Vivian (Lily Tomlin) will collect information on Albert, from workplace stresses to morning bathroom routines, while Bernard (Dustin Hoffman, sporting a marvelously goofy Beatle cut) will use that data to get inside Albert’s head. Bernard firmly relies on a philosophical theory he calls “The Blanket,” in which everything in life is interconnected and everything matters, from a hamburger to an orgasm to the Eiffel Tower.
Needless to say, Bernard’s optimistic methods prove a little too touchy-feely for the ever-angsty Albert. Ultimately, his search for truth leads him to “the dark side,” embodied by Caterine Vauban (Isabelle Huppert), a French nihilist whose business card reads “Manipulation. Cruelty. Meaninglessness.” To Caterine life’s events are just primality and random chaos, but even she admits that no one can completely escape the pull of human drama.
Speaking of human drama, what about Tommy, the petroleum-obsessed fireman who becomes Albert’s traveling companion on the road to self-discovery? And what of Dawn (Naomi Watts), Brad’s leggy girlfriend and Huckabees poster girl who suddenly rejects cashing in on her good looks and begins frumping up her appearance with saggy overalls and an Amish bonnet?
To explain the entire plot of “I Heart Huckabees” would be both spoiling the fun and easing the workload of any would-be viewer. Since everything is connected, you can bet on some third act twists where characters suddenly cross over into other characters’ subplots and back again. But, since nothing matters, don’t be surprised when other plot threads remain unsatisfying and unresolved.
The new “existential comedy” from writer/director David O’ Russell (“Three Kings,” “Flirting with Disaster”) is often too heady, too hard to follow and too smug for its own good, but it’s so energetic, inventive and sometimes hilarious that you probably won’t mind.
The gaily-irreverent script, co-written by Russell and Jeff Baena, is so overstuffed with characters and loopy ideas that it occasionally threatens to collapse itself. Self-help gurus, free love, consumerism-just about everything one can imagine gets a potshot in “Huckabees.” One wishes, however, that the story had stronger, graspable central ideas and a more concise through-line.
The point seems to be that both Bernard and Caterine are too extreme in their ideologies, that real truth lies somewhere between a rainbow and a black hole, but that doesn’t let the writers off the hook when it comes to properly defining those ideologies and clearly illustrating them.
Oh, well. If the film earnestly tries to teach us anything, it’s that life is as beautiful as it is imperfect, that we should enjoy what we have and make the most of it. This isn’t a revolutionary philosophy but it’s a heartfelt one. “I Heart Huckabees” is infinitely flawed, but it’s also infinitely lovable. Instead of dwelling on its missteps, this critic was swept up by the film.
Wait a minute. Is it possible that one of this year’s messiest movies is also one of its most brilliant? You betcha. Now how’s that for an existential crisis?
Russell does so much right with the material that you tend to overlook his wrongs. He’s assembled a great cast for his brainy shenanigans, and he’s added considerable depth and whimsy to the proceedings with the inclusion of this critic’s favorite film composer of the moment, Jon Brion (note to the Academy: between this score and the one for “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind,” at least give the guy a nomination).
And when he’s firing on all cylinders, Russell achieves a madcap modern screwball atmosphere unlike anything you’ve ever seen or likely will again. Manic wit infuses scene after scene, moment after precious moment, as Bernard calms Albert into a trance-like state replete with free-floating cubes, Vivian dives head-first through the window of a parked car, Tommy dances madly outside a burning house, Caterine writhes erotically in a muddy marsh, and Brad gets slapped around by Shania Twain.
Russell’s tics and tricks, though, wouldn’t get off the ground without his great stable of performers. Shwartzman has never been better, and Watts and Huppert (the great French actress makes a rare English-language appearance as Caterine) make lasting impressions with only a little screen time.
Law is very expressive and very effective as a go-getter whose oily consumerism and fake sincerity leave him less fulfilled than he’d hoped (the actor’s plaintive delivery of the line “How am I not myself?” is a window straight into his character’s slippery soul), and Hoffman and Tomlin are splendid as the nutty Jaffes. An ever-smiling Hoffman makes Bernard’s effusiveness downright infectious, and Lily Tomlin once again exhibits her perfection of deadpan delivery as the stone-faced, overly involved Vivian.
But this critic’s favorite character and performance belong to Mark Wahlberg, whose Tommy emerges as the true heart and soul of “Huckabees.” While Bernard drones on about the beauty of infinity, Tommy dispels the mysticism with the exhausted words “we’re not in infinity, we’re in the suburbs.” Wahlberg, unlike most of his co-stars, seems to be playing his role without irony, a choice that makes him stand out in such a vocally self-aware movie.
He mixes live-wire intensity, fumbling machismo and startling spiritual vulnerability into something truly indelible, a lost soul who’ll just as quickly cry or punch a wall as he will switch philosophies. Whether riding to fires on a bicycle or hitting himself in the face with a red rubber ball in pursuit of “pure being,” Wahlberg is what “Huckabees” should be more often-funny, shrewd AND touching.
Many of Russell’s big ideas fail to ignite. Others flame out quickly or explode without warning. Well, too bad. If these speed bumps are enough to keep you away from one of the year’s most original films from one of America’s most risk-taking directors, then you should probably give up on film altogether and give nihilism a try for a while.
Is this film as immaculate as a ray of sunshine? Nope. Is it as discouraging as a roll in the mud? Nah. It’s somewhere gloriously in between. Wacky, weird, ugly, bright and completely unforgettable, “I Heart Huckabees” is something you just have to experience for yourself.