'The Humbling' review: Al Pacino dramedy a self-indulgent mess
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A contrivance of online consumer sites like Amazon is to say, “If you liked X, you might also like Y” – with Y being something usually lesser but similar.
So, if you liked Birdman, you also might like seeing Al Pacino playing a delusional, indeed hallucinatory, actor trying to save his soul and his onstage career in the sort-of-comedy The Humbling. Or you might not.
Plot-wise, at least, there is stuff that is straight out of that movie, including the infamous “theatre lock out” scene, and well, a good portion of the ending.
Not saying anybody stole any ideas. In Hollywood, they usually call that “parallel thinking.” The parallel lines ultimately diverged, however, with the result that Birdman is an Oscar favourite, and The Humbling is a self-indulgent mess.
An astonishing amount of talent was poured into The Humbling, some of it evocative of whole other eras. It was adapted by Buck Henry from a Philip Roth novel. Director Barry Levinson ruled the ‘80s (Good Morning, Vietnam; Rain Man). Besides Pacino, there’s a formidable era-spanning cast including Dianne Wiest, Charles Grodin, Dylan Baker and Greta Gerwig (who plays Pacino’s “reformed lesbian” younger woman). Wasting a pedigree like this is actually a pretty impressive accomplishment.
The Humbling opens with Pacino doing what I think he loves most in life – lecturing us about Shakespeare. In fact, he’s arguing with himself in the dressing-room mirror about the “All the world’s a stage,” speech from As You Like It. Was his reading believable? Pacino’s character, Simon Axler, repeats the line numerous times in The Humbling, and the answer, if we were allowed to contribute to the conversation, would always be, “No.”
The angst-torn Axler collapses onstage at the beginning of the movie, and announces from his hospital bed that he’s never stepping onstage again.
For no apparent reason, the newly-retired actor receives a visit from his god-daughter (Gerwig), a college professor whom he has not seen since she was a child. Though she has lived as a lesbian (“a 16-year experiment”), she tells him she still has a crush on him. And – presto! – the movie’s central ambivalent May/December relationship is thrown onto the screen like a bewildered cat.
I’ll say this much for Gerwig’s character Pegeen. Her colourful past may be the only thing that keeps The Humbling from falling asleep on its feet. She has one nearly-psychotic ex played by Kyra Sedgwick (who does everything short of stealing Glenn Close’s famous, “I will not be ignored” line). And she has another named Prince (Billy Porter) who’d ended their earlier relationship by deciding to undergo female-male sex-assignment surgery, and who thinks they might pick up where they left off because she likes men now.
My eyes sprang open again at the sudden appearance of Pegeen’s outraged parents – played by Dianne Wiest (as Simon’s former flame) and Dan Hedaya. For an entertaining few minutes, it played like a family reunion at Woody Allen’s house.
However, this is Axler/Pacino’s show. The camera is rarely off him. And his wannabe-Learesque ruminations on his life and spent power are ostensibly what you paid for.
That being the case, it is my opinion you were ripped off.
The Humbling is on VOD and opens in Toronto and Calgary this Friday.
Twitter: @jimslotek
jim.slotek@sunmedia.ca
