David O. Russell's latest feature, Silver Linings Playbook, takes all the rules of Hollywood's conventional romance and then shows us all how its done. It tackles a sticky subject, mental illness, so directly and boldly that the product is a sometimes all-to-real, hard to watch film where we watch Bradley Cooper have multiple meltdowns and nearly destroy all his relationships.
Really the revelation of this picture is Cooper himself, who proves that he can be more then the pretty bad boy we've become accustomed to from the two Hangover films (with a third coming soon). On the surface he appears to be stable, but you watch with wide eyes as the layers are peeled back quickly to reveal a bipolar man obsessed with getting his wife back after she cheated on him with a colleague.
Jennifer Lawrence is Cooper's co-star as a mysterious woman with problems of her own. Her husband, a cop, has recently died, and the movie shows just how off-the-wall these characters are when Lawrence and Cooper first meet. Pressured by his friend to not ask how her husband died, Cooper introduces himself and then immediately springs the question. This draws Lawrence to Cooper, and she soon sets out to cure him in her own twisted way.
Rounding out the cast is Robert DeNiro as Cooper's father, an avid Eagles fan who is banned from the stadium for starting too many fights. He is one of those guys who believes that certain events in his life effect that outcome of a sports game, down to the way his controllers are facing. Jacki Weaver is unrecognizable as Cooper's mother, coming off her last role as the crazy mafia mother in Animal Kingdom (2010). And Chris Tucker, after years out of work, fits perfectly into a role as one of Cooper's mental patient friends. Boardwalk Empire fans will also recognize Steve Buscemi's brother Eli here as Cooper's.
O. Russell specializes in family dramas and exhibiting just how crazy we all are around each other. The Fighter (2010), his previous work, also showcased an East Coast family that was destroyed by drugs, and a man being controlled by his mother and brother. Drugs aren't a factor here, but Cooper's character's instability brings several tense moments to a lot of scenes as you don't know how far he might go. One of his trigger's is a Stevie Wonder song that played at his wedding, and whenever an iPod and music were present, I kept anticipating that song coming on.
Also consistent between O. Russell's two films is the strong but offbeat female lead. Both are played by actresses not normally known for being so blatantly sexualized (Amy Adams in the former and Lawrence here) but they both deliver fantastic performances and, with the screenplay, make us believe they really are these people. It's also probably no coincidence that both movies feature the female lead standing up to the male lead's parents.
Inexplicably this all culminates in a competition where everything is at stake, though I won't reveal what, how or why. O. Russell's command of our emotions is so sure that we are on the edge of our seats anyway, and its craft like that I have to admire. Silver Linings Playbook isn't a great movie, but its a damn good one, and it shows us that you can play by the rules and still deliver a damn fine product.
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