By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 3.75 cats
Director: David Cronenberg
Country: canada, france, germany, united_states
Year: 2015
Running time: 111
IMDB: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2172584
Jason says: “Hollywood stories can be self-indulgent or snide, depending on what sort of axes the people making them have to grind, rarely managing to hit the sweet spot in the middle. What they seldom are, though, is extraneous, but that’s what happens with MAPS TO THE STARS – there’s one track that’s a nifty little story with some potential. Whenever it gets into stuff that’s specifically about the movie business, on the other hand, one can’t help but be reminded that David Cronenberg used to make things far more original than this.
“The movie-star track involves Havana Segrand (Julianne Moore), a second-generation actress who has reached an age when staying relevant takes a lot of tenacity if you’re even given a chance. She’s currently focused on landing a role in a remake of one of her mother’s movies, and that mother, Clarice Taggart (Sarah Gadon) is appearing to her as something between a haunting and a hallucination. Havana has regular sessions with pop psychiatrist Dr. Stafford Weiss (John Cusack), whose own son Benjie (Evan Bird) is an actor, with mother Christina (Olivia Williams) handling his career. Agatha Weiss (Mia Wasikowska), meanwhile, is just off the bus from an institution in Florida, and while she soon lands a job as Havana’s assistant, it’s Stafford, Benjie, and Christina who are most concerned about the young woman with the burns on her skin.
“As soon as Stafford finds out that Agatha is in town, there’s a tremendous tension to the Weiss side of the film, and while what writer Bruce Wagner has concocted is maybe not enough to fill a feature-length film as it is, it probably could be with a little more effort – it’s got the makings of a Greek tragedy, and while many of the people involved are unstable in one way or another, their motivations still tend to be human and understandable. It’s a fractious enough web of relationships on its own that the bits that involve Benjie being a self-centered brat of a child actor just seem little more than the latest time over some rather well-tread ground.
“And if that’s the case with Benjie, it’s doubly so with Havana, as her story is a rapid-fire string of neurotic-actor clichés with an interesting idea buried underneath. Julianne Moore probably had lots of fun hamming it up as Havana, but it’s such a broad performance that the interesting idea of a woman who feels like she is in constant competition with her dead mother – more so than usual because her old movies allow Clarice’s image to be locked into her youth while Havana ages – is all but smothered. There are also bits of Havana’s story that seem meant to be ambiguous but which don’t actually derive any benefit from being so.
“The links between the two threads often seem random – a death in Havana’s story winds up haunting Benjie, and while Agatha’s presence in Havana’s life (and flirtation with driver/actor/writer Jerome Fontana) gives the audience some time to see what her state of mind is before reuniting her with her family, it’s just standard ‘demanding movie star being demanding’. Cronenberg squeezes what he can out of it – there are a few unnerving moments and nice juxtaposition of insanity alongside sane callousness – but for all that Wagner’s script is probably not missing much in terms of Hollywood behavior, that’s never more interesting than the particular issues within the Weiss family.
“It’s a shame to waste such a cast on this. Moore is certainly memorable as Havana, at least, although her histrionics are seldom as impressive as Mia Wasikowska’s deceptively focused Agatha. John Cusack’s Stafford Weiss gets more interesting the creepier he is allowed to be, and Olivia Williams is underused as a stage mother who certainly seems like she may have more to her. It’s amusing to see Robert Pattinson in the front of the limousine after COSMOPOLIS – and his uncertain demeanor often seems the most genuine thing in the movie – and Sarah Gadon does all right in her fourth movie by a member of the Cronenberg family in as many years.
“There’s good stuff in here, enough to make the side-track through Havana Segrand even more frustrating. The movie may be called MAPS TO THE STARS, but it would have been much better to avoid that territory and stick to one set of ugly family secrets. 2.5 cats
“Seen 28 February 2015 in Coolidge Corner Theatre #1 (first-run, DCP)”
Thom says: “I went into this film with great trepidation. For years Cronenberg had an untouchable streak of TOP-RATED films. Starting with THE BROOD (1979) followed by SCANNERS, VIDEODROME, THE DEAD ZONE, THE FLY, DEAD RINGERS, NAKED LUNCH, M. BUTTERFLY, CRASH, eXistenZ, & finally SPIDER. His next three films were all fine productions (A HISTORY OF VIOLENCE, EASTERN PROMISES, & A DANGEROUS METHOD) but their 4.5 CATS ratings displayed a vulnerability to Cronenberg that I thought might me due to his advancing age. Then when COSMOPOLIS suddenly bombed I feared the worst and thought his career might well be over.
“To my never-ending joy I find that the great Canadian director has come back stronger than ever with this superb effort with cross-the-board great acting. It is a pitch black comedy that connected immediately to my dark side. And yet, there is a total sophistication that comes from years being at the pinnacle of his profession.
“The story is indeed a dark, ticking time bomb about psychotic minor Hollywood celebrities that will assuredly do anything for success or lack thereof. Havana Segrand (Moore, in a stunning performance, one that I think is far better than her Oscar-winning one in STILL ALICE) wants to grab the lead in a forthcoming film that was originally made with her far more famous mother, who died tragically and young. Her career has been on the wane and she thinks this will propel her back towards the apex.
“She receives both bizarre physical & mental therapy from a self-help guru, Dr. Stafford Weiss (another superb, crazy performance from the ever-growing Cusack), of dubious distinction whose addled wife takes care of their insanely creepy 13-year-old son, who is a huge television sensation, the star of a mediocre sit-com, who has been in therapy since he was 9. The son, Benjie (Evan Bird in a breathtaking turn, I was told that during filming he asked Cronenberg if he could legally use all the cuss words that were inherent in his dialogue) is a wicked, mean, self-centered monster. Into all their lives descends Benjie’s wacko sister Agatha (Mia Wasikowska in her best performance to date), who was put in an asylum for criminal pyromania, and has recently been released. In a chance encounter with the real Carrie Fisher, she gets a position with Havana as a personal secretary, which we all know will end horribly.
“There’s a breath of normalcy in the story when a hustler chauffeur (Pattinson, in his first 5 CATS film) enters the story from time to time. Not that he’s a saint, but his utter ordinariness strikingly stands out from the sociopaths that surround him. Once I realized that the film was a comedy I was completely wrapped up in the wicked, wacky tale. It was no surprise to learn that the script writer had been responsible for one the of NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET films because the people portrayed here are monsters in a very real sense.
“I’m more than willing to recognize that many folks will be repulsed by this film, but for any true lovers of Cronenberg this is a film to be thrilled with. 5 cats”