She Came to Me

When Peter Dinklage, Anne Hathaway and Marisa Tomei are knocking on your screen, you cant say no. This is a stylish romantic-Drama-Comedy, which includes so many topics and issues that your head might explode during the time you are watching the movie.

Nice? Yes! Entertaining? Yeah, why not? But for a movie with stars from this caliber you expect to be legendary, no less. It is elegant, intelligent (or at least wanna be) and ambitious movie, but the script doesn't align with its leading stars and their appetences.

This movie is trying to touch art, obsession, religion, young love, advanced love, muse and what not? Each subject gets his five till ten minutes, but for so many issues dealt within one movie, it seems that every two issues could have got a separate movie with separate plot.

The movie melts and fuses several plot lines, which are interwoven with one another, without having an actual connection, but once again, the movie still maintains as an entertaining movie, with good texts, performances and even subtexts that are piled up one on the other and hiding an actual message to the viewers.

It's a forgettable movie, not your usual rom-com and the stars of it justifies watching it, just for the sake of watching them get nuts (especially Anne Hathaway in one unforgettable scene), but probably you will forget about it an hour or two after watching it, though it is not so bad.

Peter Dinklage and Marisa Tomei are absolutely fantastic in this film. Their presences on screen, individually and together, demand attention at all times. This even while struggling through a woefully pedestrian script, the expository parts of which are mind-numbingly bland. Thankfully, these two are able to rise above script. And it doesn't hurt that even made to look a bit rough as a tugboat captain, Marisa Tomei is positively gorgeous in her late 50s. But that's about where the praise slows down. The truth is, they are not on screen for nearly enough time.

There are three intertwined stories that never really quite gel cinematically (go see a John Sayles film, Lone Star, or Sunshine State to see this done masterfully). Anne Hathaway is serviceable, but in a role that could be, and largely was, phoned in. One extreme (the kreplach) scene, presumably meant to go viral, doesn't really land. Nor does the rather telegraphed final joke for her character (no spoiler).

But the anchor that drags this otherwise interesting film down is the onerous thread of the star-crossed teens. A bad script with supreme talent (Dinklage and Tomei), leaves a film short of its potential but passable. A bad script with dull and listless young actors is a recipe for an atrocious afterschool special. The ham-fisted symbolism of the father's Civil War re-enactments (isn't that really just cosplay, though?) and the 'futurism' of the teens gets hammered home. There were audible shifts from the audience with whom I watched, as scenes changed from the dynamism of the leads to the lethargy of the teen story. The biggest problem with this is that the audience needs to care about these two young people and their future. And we just don't.

Unfortunately, the three threads are needed to make the story come around full circle in the end. Only one thread is compelling with Dinklage and Tomei. Hathaway's thread had potential but ultimately was just tangential, and the teens' thread was a burden to endure to necessitate the final act. And all this and overwrought opera presentations, not good enough to be worthy of praise, but not quite so obviously parodic to garner laughter. Perhaps that's symbolic of the film itself, middling. Dinklage and Tomei deserved better.

It's a romantic comedy-drama set in current times in Brooklyn, New York. It follows the experiences and interactions of two completely different families and a tugboat captain.

Steven Lauddem (Peter Dinklage) is an insecure composer facing a deadline for a new opera with no inspiration for a storyline. He's married to Patricia (Anne Hathaway), a therapist who's a clean freak and a closet devout Catholic. She has a bright 18-year-old son, Julian (Evan Ellison), from her first marriage. She had separated from Julian's father, but he had subsequently died. They have a dog named Levi.

Magdalena Szyskowski (Joanna Kulig) is a Polish who works as a cleaning lady. She has a 16-year-old daughter, Tereza (Harlow Jane), from her first husband. She is not married to the man she's living with, Trey Ruffa (Brian d'Arcy James), but he has adopted Tereza. Trey is a court stenographer and an extreme Civil War reenactor.

We learn early on that Julian and Tereza are boyfriend-girlfriend and that Magdalena is the new cleaning lady for Steven and Patricia. None of the adults are happy when they learn of Julian & Tereza's relationship, especially Trey. We also discover that Steven suddenly gets inspiration for his opera from an encounter with tugboat captain Katrina Trento (Marisa Tomei).

"She Came to Me" follows the characters' interactions through three love stories, two of which are surprising but are clearly telegraphed as the plot unfolds. All the primary actors are excellent, especially Dinklage, Tomei, and Ellison. The story is clever and fun.

Director/screenwriter Rebecca Miller has fashioned quite a quirky relationship roundelay in this 2023 dramedy as she focuses on a dumbfounding love triangle saved from complete absurdity by the dexterity of the three leads. The plot is convoluted. Stephen Lauddem is a famous composer with writer's block who sleeps with Katrina, a shopworn tugboat captain with a sex addiction, and then writes a celebrated opera about their fast affair. Stephen is married to Patricia, a beautiful Manhattan therapist with OCD and a strange obsession with nuns. There's a parallel story of Patricia's son who is in love with the underaged daughter of the family maid whose husband is hellbent on breaking up the relationship. All the story strands come together but don't emotionally resonate nearly as much as they should. Miller seems more preoccupied with the characters' eccentricities. The star performances compensate. Peter Dinklage plays Stephen with jaundiced charm, while Anne Hathaway shows off a welcome edginess to Patricia. Marisa Tomei conveys a convincing lived-in approach to Katrina that helps ground the movie's somewhat flighty tone.

It can be a musician, an artist, a play or a film. It leaves you baffled. Liking it, is just the bonus.

The roles resemble a box of frogs. Everybody is hiding behind a curtain of creative or functional normal. Only Katrina, who in theory is the maddest of all, has the real sole and sanity. She is the most sincere.

The film jingles along - dysfunctional and baffling until that moment in the bar when Katrina interrupts sullen Steven. Immediately the chemistry kicks in. Once again Marisa Tomei edges a film.. never obvious. I couldn't issue a plethora of spoilers, as half the time I was grappling with the odd plot. Rebecca Miller directs, produces and writes a challenging and thought provoking parable ? This is a slow burner.