Brave New Jersey

Had fairly high hopes for this film. Thought it might be one of those little diamonds in the rough you come across every so often. At least the story seemed to offer potential, but alas, in the end, there was little to feel good about except the well disciplined 1:26 run time.

I suppose there were a few bright spots, though certainly not in the drawing out of the characters. Instead of this small town being populated with a few delightful, original odd-balls, what we get instead are mostly unlikeable, two-dimensional cardboard cut outs. I mean, when the character whose scenes you're most looking forward to is a kid (Grace Kaufman), that tells you a lot.

Maybe I should have gone 4 stars, but the film was easy enough to look at, and like I said earlier, they did at least keep it short.

This movie is a period piece, centering around a sleepy little town and their reactions to Orson Welles historic "War of the Worlds" broadcast -- as the story goes, this broadcast was interpreted by some as a real attack from outer space. And so, the movie has its premise, as this farming community is thrown in to chaos on Halloween night, believing they are about to be invaded by martians.

"Brave New Jersey" is cartoonish in its depiction of 1938 rural America. These don't feel like people, and they don't even feel like characters. The interpretations are modern enough, but most of them feel like they're templates being pulled from a book of "small town" archetypes.

A preacher experiencing a lapse in faith. A burned out war hero trying to recapture former glory. An overweight, inept sheriff. A soft spoken protagonist who can't find the words when it comes to the woman he loves. She herself is trapped in a marriage with a man that clearly doesn't care about her as anything other than a trophy. And so on. These people were given one note to play, and they play it loud and hard. You know what's going to happen to them the moment they finish their first sentence.

Though the movie is billed as something of a comedy, this simple characterization isn't the joke. The joke is, "isn't it silly people really believed this was happening to them?" There's a real story here, these people truly believe they're about to die, and it has a message behind that idea, but it feels really cutesy and trite. The drama feels cut short by the silly vibe, and the silly vibe doesn't really land because it's still trying to have legitimate drama. At times, when the two halves clash the hardest, it can be legitimately difficult to watch. It's oil and water.

Between those moments, the movie just feels kind of dopey, and saccharine, and occasionally even a little anachronistic. Nobody acts like this, and nobody ever acted like this. Any of the good vibes this movie tries to trade in are completely lost on me because it can't decide what it really wants.

Cannot recommend.

I was born and raised in New Jersey, so I am quite familiar with this Orson Welles' broadcasting event and even though it took place before I was born it is well known by me and probably everyone there. It's a true story, but it has a folklore feel to it. This little, sweet film barely covers the broadcast itself. It show the effects on the population in another small nearby town in a comedic way. It's well shot, well acted by all and while it's nothing special, it is a nice little movie showing what something like this can bring out in people, both good and bad. Humans can be silly things. Tony Hale of "Veep" fame is the lead and he is good, but like I said, so is everyone. There's a humorous running gag about a Polish boy who is in this a lot without a single word of dialogue. He seems more sane than many of the New Jersians shown here.

A comedy? You ar supposed to laugh while watching a comedy, right? I found this comedy oddly devoid of humor. The pace is slow and slower. As a period piece, I found many anachronisms. It's supposed to be set in New Jersey. It doesn't look like new Jersey - even in the 1930s. I know. I live in New Jersey and my family has since the 18th Century. It looks more like rural Kentucky. A film should grab you and draw you in. This one left me wondering what was on TV. My parents were alive during this time. They did not believe that Martians had landed. Most people didn't. I think a film based on Orson Wells' adaptation of what might have happened if Martians had actually landed would have made for a much better film. Otherwise, watching Buckaroo Banzai is a better use of your time.

You know how sometimes you find yourself really getting into a piece of music (let's say, some Classical piece), where it's soothingly melodic and you're thinking "this is so beautiful"...and then, out of nowhere, it just explodes into a big noisy section that totally doesn't fit with the earlier parts, and it rips you out of your reverie, leaving you thinking "why'd they ruin such a beautiful thing?"

We'll, that's how I feel about Brave New Jersey. I was thinking as I watched the opening twenty minutes or so "this is just what I needed tonight": a nice quiet character study, woven around the 1938 Orson Welles' Mercury Theatre Halloween eve radio broadcast of H. G. Well's "War of the Worlds", one of the most famous "fake news" examples of the 20th century.

But the abrupt changes of tone that several of the key characters underwent throughout the course of the film jarred me out of the nostalgic bubble the earlier dialogue had created, and left me once again thinking "why'd they do that?"

I'm still glad I finally got around to seeing it; there are some fine performances by some actors who deserved a better script, and "the look" of the film was really quite beautiful overall, but those tonal shifts will ruin a good story every time - and unfortunately, this was one of those times.

In closing, if you've never yet had the true joy of listening to the original radio broadcast that reportedly really did manage to scare the daylights out of a great many people (remember, this was a time when radio was the main news and information source in the country, the looming war in Europe had everyone on edge, and the effects of the Great Depression were still very much evident), there are still available today excellent, clear as a bell copies to listen to all over the internet, and I'd urge you to find one, turn out the lights, and imagine yourself back in that time...you may just want to go hide somewhere, too!

Peace! MFF/Honolulu 8-14-22.