Another Noah Baumbach film for Walter not to like, and another ***+ from me (the usual for Baumbach). My review of Mistress America can be found at Third Way Cafe: http://thirdway.com/mistress-america/
After watching Frances Ha a few months ago (and finding it quite watchable if still lacking in something), I decided to give this one a try. Mistress America marks a turning point: I officially really liked a Noah Baumbach film. While the characters were still flawed, I found them likable and interesting (as opposed to messes like Squid and Greenberg). I also found the film to be meaningful - something I was not able to discern in the older films, though I'll grant that some social commentary was present. Interestingly, I actually liked the scene that you found disappointing. It felt like the point was the way that "real life" can become farce (i.e. I did not find that scene "dishonest" but simply a switch of genre which I gather was intentional). Partly I was more accepting of this because I did not consider the rest to be especially honest - as for Frances Ha, I still found a lot of the dialogue and settings to be contrived (though I don't particularly mean this to be critical - I'm just saying that honesty does not seem to be a strong feature for me in Baumbach's movies but maybe my life is simply too different??). Nevertheless - I really enjoyed this movie; whatever completely turned me off in the past was completely absent in this movie.
After watching Frances Ha a few months ago (and finding it quite watchable if still lacking in something), I decided to give this one a try. Mistress America marks a turning point: I officially really liked a Noah Baumbach film. While the characters were still flawed, I found them likable and interesting (as opposed to messes like Squid and Greenberg). I also found the film to be meaningful - something I was not able to discern in the older films, though I'll grant that some social commentary was present. Interestingly, I actually liked the scene that you found disappointing. It felt like the point was the way that "real life" can become farce (i.e. I did not find that scene "dishonest" but simply a switch of genre which I gather was intentional). Partly I was more accepting of this because I did not consider the rest to be especially honest - as for Frances Ha, I still found a lot of the dialogue and settings to be contrived (though I don't particularly mean this to be critical - I'm just saying that honesty does not seem to be a strong feature for me in Baumbach's movies but maybe my life is simply too different??). Nevertheless - I really enjoyed this movie; whatever completely turned me off in the past was completely absent in this movie.
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