Prime
3.5/4
Starring: Uma Thurman, Bryan Greenburg, Meryl Streep, Jon Abrahams
Rated PG-13 for Sexual Content including Dialogue, and for Language
"Prime" is one of the best romantic comedies to come along in years. I haven't seen one better since it was released, and I certainly can't remember a movie that balanced romance and comedy this well off the top of my head. It's at times very funny, but there's also an element of emotional honesty running through it as well. We believe in the characters and their situations.
Rafi (Thurman) is as 37 year old living in New York City. She's smart, cultured and beautiful. She's also coming off a messy divorce and is seeing a therapist, Dr. Lisa Metzger (Streep). Almost immediately after the divorce, she meets David Bloomberg (Greenberg), a handsome, smart and funny young man. He asks her out and the two hit it off magically. There's a problem, however. David is 23. And what neither of them knows is that the good Doctor is David's mother. Oops.
Critics criticzed the trailers for giving a way the fact that David and Lisa are related. Such criticisms baffle me because it's really not much of a spoiler. Lisa finds out the truth fairly early, and it leads to some hilarious complications. And the film doesn't pretend that keeping Rafi in the dark is an ethical thing to do, so it's not as Roger Ebert called it, an Idiot Plot. This aspect of the story takes up only about a third of the movie. The rest of it is used by writer/director Ben Younger to explore the many facets of love.
The acting is strong across the board. Uma Thurman, always an exciting actress, gives her best performance as Rafi. One thing I liked about Rafi is that Thurman and Younger don't take the easy way out and turn her into a nutcase. Most people who see therapists are not borderline psychotics, so this is a refreshing change of pace from the caricatures that usually take this role. She's independent, but also vulnerable. In other words, she's a normal person. Bryan Greenberg, who appeared in "The Perfect Score," one of the worst films ever made, acquits himself admirably in the role of Rafi's new squeeze. He's outshined by Thurman and Streep, but he's adorable, and much more than a mere hunk. He's sweet, funny and charming, but he's also immature and naiive. It's not hard to see why Rafi falls for him. And Meryl Streep is terrific as always. Lisa Metzger is really a motherly sort of person. Frumpy, a little neurotic, but wise. It takes less than a second to stop seeing Meryl Streep and see only Lisa Metzger (but that's how it always is with Streep, isn't it?). Also of note is Jon Abrahams who plays Morris, David's meathead best friend. Abrahams has been funny before, but he's hysterical as a guy who throws pies in the faces of girls who turn him down for a second date.
Ben Younger is a great young director. He made the thrilling "Boiler Room," about young men who are duped into working at a fraudulent investment firm. Here, he does a movie in a polar opposite genre. He shows a rare skill in fleshing out his human protagonists and nurturing their relationships; the change of direction from comedy to drama (something that often defeats many filmmakers) works because we like the characters and care about their relationships. He also knows how to use human nature for comic purposes, and he treads the line between farce and a dead zone. As of yet, Younger only has two credits as a writer/director (he has two more projects in the making), and he's a fresh talent that must be given more opportunities. I anxiously await his next projects.
Not everything in this film works; some of the humor doesn't fly (David's teeth clacking is more awkward than romantic) and there's some ripe dialogue at the end, but all in all this is a highly enjoyable movie.
Starring: Uma Thurman, Bryan Greenburg, Meryl Streep, Jon Abrahams
Rated PG-13 for Sexual Content including Dialogue, and for Language
"Prime" is one of the best romantic comedies to come along in years. I haven't seen one better since it was released, and I certainly can't remember a movie that balanced romance and comedy this well off the top of my head. It's at times very funny, but there's also an element of emotional honesty running through it as well. We believe in the characters and their situations.
Rafi (Thurman) is as 37 year old living in New York City. She's smart, cultured and beautiful. She's also coming off a messy divorce and is seeing a therapist, Dr. Lisa Metzger (Streep). Almost immediately after the divorce, she meets David Bloomberg (Greenberg), a handsome, smart and funny young man. He asks her out and the two hit it off magically. There's a problem, however. David is 23. And what neither of them knows is that the good Doctor is David's mother. Oops.
Critics criticzed the trailers for giving a way the fact that David and Lisa are related. Such criticisms baffle me because it's really not much of a spoiler. Lisa finds out the truth fairly early, and it leads to some hilarious complications. And the film doesn't pretend that keeping Rafi in the dark is an ethical thing to do, so it's not as Roger Ebert called it, an Idiot Plot. This aspect of the story takes up only about a third of the movie. The rest of it is used by writer/director Ben Younger to explore the many facets of love.
The acting is strong across the board. Uma Thurman, always an exciting actress, gives her best performance as Rafi. One thing I liked about Rafi is that Thurman and Younger don't take the easy way out and turn her into a nutcase. Most people who see therapists are not borderline psychotics, so this is a refreshing change of pace from the caricatures that usually take this role. She's independent, but also vulnerable. In other words, she's a normal person. Bryan Greenberg, who appeared in "The Perfect Score," one of the worst films ever made, acquits himself admirably in the role of Rafi's new squeeze. He's outshined by Thurman and Streep, but he's adorable, and much more than a mere hunk. He's sweet, funny and charming, but he's also immature and naiive. It's not hard to see why Rafi falls for him. And Meryl Streep is terrific as always. Lisa Metzger is really a motherly sort of person. Frumpy, a little neurotic, but wise. It takes less than a second to stop seeing Meryl Streep and see only Lisa Metzger (but that's how it always is with Streep, isn't it?). Also of note is Jon Abrahams who plays Morris, David's meathead best friend. Abrahams has been funny before, but he's hysterical as a guy who throws pies in the faces of girls who turn him down for a second date.
Ben Younger is a great young director. He made the thrilling "Boiler Room," about young men who are duped into working at a fraudulent investment firm. Here, he does a movie in a polar opposite genre. He shows a rare skill in fleshing out his human protagonists and nurturing their relationships; the change of direction from comedy to drama (something that often defeats many filmmakers) works because we like the characters and care about their relationships. He also knows how to use human nature for comic purposes, and he treads the line between farce and a dead zone. As of yet, Younger only has two credits as a writer/director (he has two more projects in the making), and he's a fresh talent that must be given more opportunities. I anxiously await his next projects.
Not everything in this film works; some of the humor doesn't fly (David's teeth clacking is more awkward than romantic) and there's some ripe dialogue at the end, but all in all this is a highly enjoyable movie.
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