Movies…with a little bit of obscure culture and sports mixed in
“Based on the best-selling pair of memoirs from father and son David and Nic Sheff, Beautiful Boy chronicles the heartbreaking and inspiring experience of survival, relapse and recovery in a […]
“Based on the best-selling pair of memoirs from father and son David and Nic Sheff, Beautiful Boy chronicles the heartbreaking and inspiring experience of survival, relapse and recovery in a family coping with addiction over many years.”
Director: Felix van Groeningen
Writers: Luke Davies, Felix van Groeningen, David Sheff
Starring: Steve Carell, Maura Tierney, Jack Dylan Grazer, Timothée Chalamet, Amy Aquino, Carlton Wilborn
Release Date: October 25, 2018
IMDB
By no means should anyone approach Beautiful Boy (2018) thinking it’s going to be an easy viewing experience. This 2018 drama is steeped in depressing realism because it’s based on the written memoirs of the father and son, David and Nic Sheff. Beautiful Boy tells the story of a father’s manic desire to understand his drug addicted son, and it’s a story that punches the audience with unabashed sincerity.
David Sheff (Steve Carell) is a writer and we meet him in the office of an addiction expert asking for help. David is desperate to try and reestablish some sort of connection with Nic (Timothée Chalamet), his drug addicted son. Crystal Meth and a slew of other vices have taken over Nic’s life, and David is trying to swim through the personal and family side effects without drowning in desperation.
While drug addiction is not something I can whole-heartedly relate to, Beautiful Boy has the larger message that sometimes you need to distance yourself from a situation to really be of help. The idea of extending an olive branch of aid is important in most circumstances, but there are moments in life where you have to know to walk away for the safety of yourself and the person you are caring for.
You can’t help others if you are pouring from an empty cup. That is the heartbreaking realization that David must come to grips within this story. There comes a point where Nic has to help himself because he has burnt every bridge he has crossed, and that has to be a depressing come-to-jesus moment for a father of a drug addict.
With that thought in mind, such is why I say this is the best performance I have seen Steve Carell give. Now, let’s get this out in the open, I am not a The Office fan, so Michael Scott is nowhere near my favorite Carell. Seeing Carell put on his drama shoes is always a relished treat, and Beautiful Boy sees Carell take on a character that you feel both sorrow and endearment for. You are begging for David to win back Nic, and the scary truth of the matter is that David doesn’t have final say on if his dream can be fulfilled.
So yes, I do believe that Carell is better here in Beautiful Boy than he was in his Oscar nominated role in Foxcatcher (2014).
And there is the young man, Timothée Chalamet. What a run this lad was on in the late 2010. He bursts onto the scene with Call Me By Your Name (2017), then is part of the critically acclaimed Lady Bird (2017), and follows that up with the undersaw western Hostiles (2017) and then makes Beautiful Boy. Hell, after this he has The King (2019) and Little Women (2019). I am here to say that Chalamet is a good actor. I’ll say it.
In Beautiful Boy, Chalamet is good, but not otherworldly. This is tough for me to prove because I didn’t live through it like the Sheff family did, but there are scenes where Nic’s antics are extremely over-the-top. The scene between David and Nic in the coffee shop comes to mind as being well thought out but overwrought. Again, I don’t claim to know better, but just from a viewing experience it struck me this way.
From a directing standpoint, this is the first English-language feature debut for Felix van Groeningen. I have not seen any of his other films, but find it interesting that he arranged for two weeks of rehearsals with the cast, which is a common practice for Flemish films and not Hollywood productions.Why would this not be a common practice? Is it merely a timing thing?
What Groeningen, the script, and the cast get most right in Beautiful Boy are the seemingly small but utmost sad moments. When David is told over the phone that addicts escaping a rehab facility is part of the normal process, well that nearly made me clutch my pearls. Can you imagine hearing that as a parent? The facility that you trust to rehab your sick child is blatantly saying that escape is normal and not entirely unexpected; that wasn’t in the brochure with sign up!
Then there are the moments in the story where the younger siblings of the Sheff family voice their knowledge that their older brother is addicted to drugs. Imagine that as a parent, another gut punch. But both David and his second wife Karen (Maura Tierney) handle it with an upfrontness that’s distressing but needed. Nic’s affliction has sewn its way permanently into the family’s everyday life.
Beautiful Boy is a deeply personal story, so to poke holes in it is not a fun process. The fact this movie was based off both David and Nic’s separate memoirs makes sure that you hear from both sides. In 2008 David’s book Beautiful Boy: A Father’s Journey Through His Sons Addiction reached number one on New York Times Best Sellers List, and then Nic followed up with a short memoir of his own, Tweak: Growing Up On Methamphetamines.
Beautiful Boy the movie takes all the writings and the unique family dynamics and creates a hard to watch but rewarding family drama. Again, praise to Carell for putting forth a performance that created more empathy for the father than then son. Each generation has its own sadness that is rightfully bestowed upon them, but it’s the overwhelmed father that carries the story.
Now, a few random tid-bits to end it. There are a few The Wire alumni in Beautiful Boy, and seeing those actors back in a story about drugs and addiction is a comfort….as twisted as that may sound. Also, hand up, because I have mixed up Beautiful Boy with Boy Erased (2018). Both movies came out in the same year and have a unique father/son relationship; sure the subject matter is a tad different but they are always betwixted in my brain.
Beautiful Boy is streaming on Amazon Prime.
STANKO RATING: B
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