In detail
Photography and lighting
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10.0
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Sound design
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6.0
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C’mon C’mon is the latest movie directed by Mike Mills and starring Joaquin Phoenix that is now available to watch on Prime Video. Johnny is a journalist who interviews children, and surprisingly finds himself in the care of his 9-year-old nephew, who is completely unknown.
The premise of this film is not exactly characterized by its originality, rather it is a trigger that we have seen in many productions, and they almost always work. But C’mon C’mon manages to turn a small plot into a big story. loaded with sensitivityd and depth, the latest film by Mike Mills takes away tears and hearts.
Johnny (Joaquin Phoenix) is a journalist who is dedicated to interviewing children from different states, in which he asks them questions about their view of the world and the future. He is a completely lonely man whose anguish and emptiness overflow in his eyes. One year after her mother’s death, she gets in touch with her sister Viv (Gaby Hoffmann), whom she hasn’t seen since. Quickly and surprisingly, Viv must go on a leave of absence to help her ex-husband (Scoot Mcnairy) who is going through a deep psychological crisis, and Johnny offers to babysit her nine-year-old nephew, Jesse (Woody Norman), an intelligent and sensitive little boy, full of endless questions typical of his age. As they begin to get to know each other, Jesse accompanies his uncle to interview other children in New York, fascinated by the world of documentaries and sound.
C’mon C’mon is filmed entirely in black and white, with an austere and stripped-down staging, a deliberately narrative decision: this story needs no more resources than the links between the characters that make it up. The movie has the enormous capacity to sharpen the most everyday feelings and also the deepest and most symbolic ones, putting them into words and gestures that cross the screen, and also the viewer. It is undoubtedly a dialogue film, which rests entirely on the exchanges between Johnny and Jesse, in which both must face unanswered questions, but this time neither is alone. They have.
Have you ever thought about the future?
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“Did you ever think about the future?” It is the main phrase that Johnny uses in his interviews with different children, opening the door for them to express everything they think about the world, how it works, how they live it, and the role that adults play in the construction of the future. Most tend to declare, with few fleas, that adults are too busy to be aware of the future, and that most of the time they do not even notice what is happening around them. This is an important point in the narrative construction, because it establishes the concept that underlies the film’s 109 minutes, making our protagonist face, accompanied by his nephew, his own question.
The combination between the verbosity of a child who questions and cross-examines openly, without filters and without shame, and a man who does not know what he is doing with his lifeendow all situations with an emotionality and a sensitivity that explores the edges of two souls in pain who meet to keep each other company, and trial and error, between arguments, anger, tantrums and despair for not knowing how to actThey try to understand how to live.
It was plausible that due to the way the story is carried, it falls back on being an ode to resilience, and to the cheap advice that love can do anything, and you can always be better, but not only does it not, but that escapes with height from these ups and downs. C’mon c’mon is fundamentally human, and as such, it does not seek to show only light, but the perfect balance between black and white, so necessary to know alive. And at this point, the aesthetic and photographic decision, seems completely right.
The film doesn’t need any major technical fireworks, because it has it all: a brilliant story, brought to the screen by an incredible acting duo such as Joaquín Phoenix and Woody Norman, to whom these characters seem to be painted. Two solitudes that meet, and that in their conjunction, create a new language, combining the tenderness and innocence of childhood, and the journey that adulthood brings with it.
Datasheet
Original title: C’mon c’mon
Year: 2022
duration: 109 minutes
Gender: Drama
Creator: Mike Mills
Department: Joaquin Phoenix, Woody Norman, Gaby Hoffmann
Where to see: Amazon Prime Video
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