‘I’ ON CULTURE
I was really disappointed with the new Cameron Crowe film Aloha. His Jerry Maguire and Almost Famous were two of my favorite movies of the 1990s, both literate and witty. The new film tries to cram three different stories into one film, and clearly suffers from having been cut back so much that the main stories are barely coherent.
Brian Gilcrest (Bradley Cooper), a defense contractor, arrives in Hawaii as part of his job working for billionaire Carson Welch (Bill Murray). His basic job is to persuade the “King of Hawaii” (a native activist, played by Bumpy Kanahele, who plays himself) to allow the digging up of an old native cemetery so that a factory can go up to provide backing for space communications satellites. He is assigned to a “watchdog,” far-too-perky Air Force Capt. Allison Ng (Emma Stone). To complicate matters, as he arrives, he sees Tracy Woodside (Rachel McAdams), the woman he almost was engaged to 13 years earlier, who promptly asks him to visit her family.
The main story focuses on the relationship between Gilcrest and Ng as he negotiates his deal. Their chemistry is not off the charts; she seems far more interested in him. In the middle of all of this, there are questions about the payload of the rocket that Welch is launching. While there is barely enough structure to figure out the story, there are many questions raised. Gilcrest is supposed to be a sort of sleazy mercenary, but near the end, he suddenly becomes the computer genius needed to prevent disaster. Previously, all we had seen of his computer skills was the use of a flash drive.
There is a love triangle that sort of turns into a quadrangle. Tracy has two children, and her daughter is 12. Anyone who has been going to movies for the past few decades can do the math… break up with Gilcrest 13 years earlier, but have a 12-year-old kid. Tracy has problems with her uncommunicative husband Woody (John Krasinski). Their relationship and interaction with Gilcrest is far more interesting than the main story, but is given far too little time, although Crowe gets a couple of great scenes, using Gilcrest and then subtitles to translate Woody’s body language.
Cooper is charming as always. Unfortunately, his portrayal is damaged by the obvious fact that a lot has been edited out. We know that he stole money from Welch, we know he was hurt dealing with various partisans in Afghanistan. But then, as noted earlier, he becomes a computer whiz who is also able to persuade someone over the radio to totally violate the rules as a plot twist.
Stone is adorable even though there seems almost no reason she should really be interested in Gilcrest. Unfortunately, the dialogue seems focused more on portentous statements than on realism, with a heavy focus on the evils of the rich.
McAdams is marvelous. She is able to win us over by underplaying her scenes. We listen to her rather than to others’ banter. And Krasinski, with few lines of actual dialogue, is an effective foil for her.
Danielle Rose Russell steals scenes and hearts as the daughter. The final scene of the film is absolutely lovely and demonstrates wonderful acting ability. That she is pretty enough to not only play McAdams’ daughter but to be described as looking like the older woman bodes well for her.
Alec Baldwin does his usual blowhard role in a few scenes as the general on the scene. Murray is wasted. He is in a few scenes that seem to make him a sort of a genius and have nothing much at all to do with the film.
Crowe clearly wanted to make his points with the film, and that is the problem. Romantic comedy works best when the focus is on the leads meeting and falling in love. In Aloha, the two leads seem more interested in anything but each other, and since the two are both poorly defined, it becomes hard to root for them. The relationship between Tracy and Woody was far more interesting.
This is one of those films that are fairly painless except, of course, for those of us disappointed because the film was far less than we hoped it would be.
