The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby: Her

The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby…Her (2013)

With a title that is suspiciously catchy (as in the Beatles song) I expected a quirky comedy, or a weak independent flick. Instead I found a seriously good, thoughtful, straight ahead movie about a young woman facing a huge crisis in her life. Around her is a family that seems more or less normal, and friends who seem supportive in the ways we all expect. And it turns out this is one of three probing movies in a triptych about this difficult normality.

It is the cracks in our normal world this movie tries to explore. Like how the small things in family and friends can rub the wrong way, or how little flaws in a person's make-up can lead to small disasters, which accumulate. It's all beautifully told, with subtle acting all around including a minor but gentle presence as the woman's father by William Hurt and an odd but eventually important role as the woman's professor by Viola Davis.

It is Jessica Chastain, for sure, who makes this movie soar. She's subtle enough, underacting as needed, and physical enough, moving through the scenes with snap (including the startling first scene), she keeps the movie especially alive. In some unexpected way it might be compared to the more amazing Frances Ha, though there must be better examples of following a young woman through her struggles for purpose and place in an ordinary, contemporary world. On difference is certainly that the title Character (Eleanor) has suffered a huge disaster and doesn't quite show it. She seems out of sorts, but not on the edge of ruin. Chastain is somehow remarkable, anyway, though, playing her part with feeling but not overplaying it. It's the writing and direction that needed a little tilting into reality.

If you are wondering about the other two movies, read on: the idea is not exactly new, but still adds depth. The Him and Her movies show a series of events from two different points of view, which of course is how life works. This version (Her) is from the woman's point of view, and is maybe the best for me because I really like Chastain.

Beware of the third movie, however—which has the suffix: Them. This is a mash of the first two, a shortened single version that apparently lacks the potentially probing aspects of the two halves, which are sometimes released together as a marathon version that is not the combined Them.

I suggest giving this one an honest try. It's really better than some of the complaints if taken just as it stands, alone. Whether you should then see the Him version then depends on you.

The Disppearance Of Eleanor Rigby (nothing to do with the Beatles song except a brief reference by a character) is a thoughtful, exceptionally well made film about a couple dealing with an immense tragedy that has put a weight on their relationship, forcing them to take some time apart. James Macavoy, an actor who continues to impress, and Jessica Chastain, always amazing, play the two with diligent feeling and palpable hurt. Now, there's three different edits of the film. His, which is mostly his side of events following the breakup, where Macavoy takes center stage and we see his life. Hers, which shows us where Chastain ends up, and how she is coping. The third version, Theirs, is a truncated version of both stories, leaving out a lot of key scenes and important beats. His and Hers together come out to about four hours of movie watching, but if you're going to invest yourself in their story, you owe it to you self to watch them both, starting with His. Because there is four hours of their story, they are allowed to develop and interact in a fashion that feels far more genuine and lifelike than a rushed two and a half hour movie. Macavoy is an aspiring cook who runs a small café with his friend and sous chef (Bill Hader, fiercely funny) and yearns for Chastain, angry at life for throwing them the curveball it did. He moves in with his father (Ciaran Hinds gives phenomenal work), a successful restauranteer. Chastain moves in with her folks as well, played by Isabelle Huppert and William Hurt. Hurt, who hasn't been around that much lately, makes up for that by anchoring a key scene with Chastain. It's interesting that he gets to play her father in a film, because they both share a measured, baleful, hypnotic grace in their work, and seeing them interacting was a treat for me, being an immense fan of both their work. Now, the film is more than the sum of its parts, but I mean that in a good way, since the parts themselves are so brilliantly done as well. It's what we expect from the romantic drama Avenue, but because we see an extended fluidity to the work, a narrative free from the fractured conventions of usual editing styles, we feel right there with our two protagonists, every step of the way. More films should break the mold and try to be more than just segmented movies, and use immersion techniques like this to draw us in. Coupled with that unique method of delivery comes a sincere commitment from actors and director alike, to explore an aspect of life and relationships that many see as unpleasant or upsetting, yet can still make for beautiful work. Well worth a watch.

Continuing on from the frustration experienced in the saga's Him component, Her struggles to engage the audience in a meaningful way despite it featuring an assured Jessica Chastain performance and a few genuine moments of emotional power centred around loss and regret.

A large portion of frustration towards this entry stems from the fact that even though we do feel for Eleanor as a person we can't fully commit to liking her and she remains a cold and sometimes undeniably unlikeable figure throughout this components run time. She's a woman dealing with a great personal tragedy and a conflicted mindset, yet she's also someone that seems unappreciative of the friends around her and their helpful suggestions or ideas, in other words Eleanor comes off as someone who is to self-assured to see the positives around her.

Somewhere deep down in both Him and Her is a great film and one feels that if the best of both chapters were combined into one singular film it would be a much more recommendable if still slightly unoriginal tale, and perhaps that is the reason Them came into existence. With some nice turns by McAvoy and Chastain, these films remain watchable but never reach the heights they so easily could've had the hard slog journey been worth it in the final payoff.

2 Diet Cokes out of 5

For me, I think the two films are two of the most realistic films I have ever seen. Chastain & McAvoy are brilliant and I'm glad we got to see both sides of the story. But I did tend to like "him" a little bit better. I will say that I think "Her" is better acted. When you have greats like Viola Davis and William Hurt as supporting actors that are essential to moving the story forward, you know you have something good on your hands. This side of the story is darker and more depressing as it more closely deals with unimaginable situation of losing someone very close to you.

The most powerful thing that was said in either film was the idea that "You can change a person just by living". It's definitely true, there are people close to me that directly impact my life whether I see them or not. Just by living, they are changing my life. It's something I don't really think about, but I will now. Also the idea of memory is brought up a lot. Chastain's character, Eleanor, talks about the concept of only remembering things once or twice in your entire life, and then it's gone. It's pretty morbid if you ask me. After seeing this one second, I always thought about perception, and how the way events unfold and if I see things differently than people close to me. Even in the slightest bit, I think it's pretty evident we do.

Overall, the films are worth watching if you like darker and more realistic types of love stories. I just don't think I ever want to watch these films again. They are just too depressing. But without question they are brilliantly acted and superbly shot. I'm glad I checked them out.

+Chastain's range

+Tackling different and difficult concepts

+Beautiful to look at

-Very dark

7.4/10

The sadness of being an incorrigible completist, I have to finish all these three films before writing my review, Ned Benson's ambitious feature-length debut is a post-trauma story of a young couple Conor (McAvoy) and Eleanor (Chastain) in New York after losing their child in an unspecified accident, HIM centres on Conor and HER centres on Eleanor in the same time period, then interweaves these two versions together, there arrives THEM, one can get an overall view of their paralleled life. So basically, I have watched the same movie twice, and certain scenes three times where the path of Conor and Eleanor converges.

The premise is soundingly intriguing, as often cornily referred as two separate cerebral hemispheres, the film allows viewers to observe how men and women think and act differently towards the same scenario, in this case, a heartbroken tragedy. In HIM, the movie starts with one of their most intimate memory before their bereavement, an inadvertent thrill in their ordinary life sparks strong romance with Conor amorously says: "There is only one heart in this body, please have mercy on me". Then it jumps to several months of the aftermath, Eleanor uses an extreme method to declare that their life can not sustain as the status quo, they need to take a break. Conor doesn't understand why she needs her alone-time for her grievance, he is equally heartbroken, but he is ready to move on, leaving the tragedy behind with a seal on it, not to mention and keeps living on afterwards. He opens a bar with his best friend Stuart (Hader) and a flirty barmaid Alexis (Arianda) who is ready to "falling in love with him madly if he allows her". Meanwhile his father Spencer (Hinds) owns a successful restaurant named after Conor's mother, whom he dumped ages ago, it is also a thorny decision for him whether or not to swallow his pride to admit failure and take the restaurant inasmuch as his bar is on the brink of bankrupt, it is a privileged struggle as a rich kid's blues.

In HER, no romantic prologue, Eleanor is introduced in her abrupt suicidal behaviour, then she returns to her bourgeoisie parents living in the suburb (played by Hurt and Huppert, he is a university professor and she is French), she goes back to the college and takes a class of professor Lillian Friedman (Davis), before long Conor finds out her whereabouts, stalks her in the street, in the classroom and eagerly to reconnect. As Hurt carefully phrases "Tragedy is a foreign country, we don't know how to talk to the natives", Conor's tentative makeup doesn't work, Eleanor needs to be over-indulged in the past for some time before finally moving forward, plus, she can spend all the time she wants in Paris, to heal her wounds, after a whimsical but failed reconnection during a pouring rain and a vis-a-vis opening-up in the middle of the night, it is rather tedious for her to realise that she should take a real break out of the Tri-state area. The disparity erected between each and every individuals cannot be compromised, only when they arrive in the same page with the same pace, they may have a chance to start anew as a couple.

As often as he can, Benson intends to throw snappy verbal rejoinders to sound posh or vivacious, but most of the time they are ill-placed ("Now YOU sound maternal" throwaway) and uninspired, as most of the dialogues verge on beating around the bush either without any substantial function or being painstakingly predictable. Yet the two leads is recommendable in any rate, so it is safe to say the film is perfect for McAvoy and Chastain's stalwarts, both set off a full gamut of emotional overhaul and not to mention many close-ups to let their fans luxuriate in the idolatry. Among the eclectic supporting cast, Huppert radiates in every scene simply by holding a glass of red wine in her hand, and Davis thrusts her raw gravitas into her casual bantering with her THE HELP (2010, 8/10) co- star, as an outsider, she is the one who pierces through the surface without any scruples, only if she could have more screen time in it.

The indie soundtrack is an understandable trapping of the prevalent mumblecore output, it's ambient, moody and meditative, tailor-made to outline the disposition of the storyline. Collectively speaking, the films attempt to be artistic and unique, it could have hit the bull- eye with all such a talented group, only if it could subtract the permeating tint of narcissism, and conjure up some more salient epiphany. At last, the THEM version abridges some minor sequences and merges HIM and HER with an intact take on the proceedings. There is no new scenes added, so one can choose to watch HIM and HER, or THEM, either is sufficiently competent to disclose its allure and drawbacks.