IT’S NO MARY POPPINS Charlize’s nanny story is a flop
Barely a spoonful of humour, really quite atrocious in parts. After Charlize Theron’s nanny drama, please...
Amazingly, it is more than ten years since Diablo Cody hit all sorts of headlines making her screen-writing debut with Juno, that still highly-regarded, bittersweet tale of unplanned teen pregnancy starring Ellen Page. The avalanche of publicity was partly prompted by Cody’s unique CV – there aren’t many successful strippers turned journalists turned Hollywood screenwriters – and partly because of the genuine originality of her creative voice.
Juno was funny, grandiloquent, moving and authentic.
Sadly, you can’t say the same of her latest effort, Tully, which sees her reunited with Charlize Theron for a second time – Theron was the star of Cody’s 2012 comedy Young Adult – and with Juno director Jason Reitman for a third.
The pivotal moment that will divide audiences comes late on and I don’t intend to spoil it. What I will say is that when this undeniably well-concealed big twist is finally revealed, I had to stifle a groan of disappointment. That? Again? Really?
Behind me, an anguished whisper of ‘No-ooo’ suggested I was not alone, although a couple of quiet sniffs further along the row indicated that the film was still working for some.
Theron’s physical commitment to a part is well known. The South African beauty famously piled on the pounds and spent hours each day in make-up for her Oscar-winning role as a female serial killer in Monster and shaved her head for Mad Max: Fury Road. Here she’s back on the crisps, full-cream milkshakes and pizza, reportedly putting on 50lb to convincingly play the central role of Marlo, an already highly stressed mother of two (her son has behavioural problems and might lazily be described as ‘autistic’), whose life threatens to hit breaking point with the imminent arrival of a third.
Until, that is, her wealthy brother offers to fund the hiring of a night nanny (‘They’re like ninjas,’ he enthuses, ‘you’ll barely know they’re there’). The pretty, kooky and distinctly unorthodox Tully (Mackenzie Davis) duly arrives at the front door one evening and we all think: ‘Ah, a nocturnal Mary Poppins.’ And that’s pretty much what this is for a good while. And maybe that’s the problem: our expectations or, at least, mine. Cody is best known for quirky comedy, as is Reitman, who, when not working with Cody, made both Up In The Air and Thank You For Smoking. And that seems to be what they are after here, although – somewhat uncomfortably – it doesn’t really work.
Theron makes Marlo a difficult woman to warm to, Reitman underlines the exhausting horrors of a new baby to an alarming degree, and the few laughs here are modest ones. Nor does the film properly explain Theron’s zealous, possibly over-zealous, preparation for the role. Only later are both these apparent shortcomings explained, albeit in a way that left me more exasperated than impressed and which hardcore Cody fans may recognise.
Davis, whom some might recognise from supporting roles in
‘The pace is slow, the tone elusive, and the end result left me disappointed’
both Blade Runner 2049 and The Martian, makes a reasonable fist of the free-spirited, crop-top-wearing Tully, who seems to come alive at night just as an exhausted Marlo runs completely out of steam.
With Tully uttering the magic words, ‘And so to bed’, some sort of domestic equilibrium is slowly restored. Marlo starts wearing make-up again, exercise is taken, that sort of thing.
But an ability to quote Samuel Pepys isn’t the only thing that’s a little bit odd about Tully. She stays and watches when she brings the baby up to Marlo to feed, she has a complicated love life (she’s in several relationships, she explains) and, in a really creepy scene, seems a little too eager to get Marlo’s postnatal sex life back on track. I wanted to like Tully more; expected to like it more, even. But the pace is slow, the tone elusive and the end result left me disappointed. Mary Poppins it ain’t.