Greenberg (DVD Catch-Up)

Noah Baumbach is especially inured with characters who are: 1. stuck in their lives and 2. fiercely unlikeable. The writer/director's latest offering follows suit, and while some of his past creations were still engaging due to their narcissism and magnetic cruelty, Roger Greenberg (Ben Stiller) is a prodigious bore.

He has recently left a mental hospital to housesit for his brother. Roger is a carpenter, though he wants to do a lot of nothing. He doesn’t drive and still thinks of himself as a musician, even though his band dissolved fifteen years earlier due to what he asserts are principled protests. Despite that, he still depends on his former bandmates for social interaction, especially Ivan (Rhys Ifans), who has since started a family and established a career. Theirs is a friendship based mainly on stale in-jokes and shared experiences.

Roger tries to rekindle a relationship with Beth (Jennifer Jason Leigh), who knows him too well to get involved again, and he shifts his attention to his brother’s assistant Florence (Greta Gerwig). She just left a relationship and, at 25 has been out of college as long as she was in it, musing that “nobody cares if I get up in the morning.” She lacks backbone and will do whatever is expected or demanded of her, apologizing all the while. In this pairing Roger meets no resistance, and Florence benefits from a little attention, though Roger quickly wears out his welcome with his whimpering aggression.

He defines himself far more by what he is not than by what he is, and has devolved into the ‘nothing’ he’s looking for. For all of his values, he will quickly do what he can to avoid an uncomfortable situation. He uses his brother’s dog as a proxy for his own condition and communication, pestering Florence to drive them to the vet for treatment. He’s also entrenched in the past, and seems most adept at launching into a volley of nitpicking rants and writing letters to organizations he feels have aggrieved him.

Florence gets pregnant and visits a center for a D&C, and Roger leaves her a message unloading his thoughts and feelings. He impulsively decides to accompany his niece to Australia, but panics in the car and escapes to see Florence. While they end up together, none of this feels engaging or earned. Rather than depict his increasing stability and loyalty, it comes across as more fecklessness. He’s again taking the safe thing, and Florence is left with the warm body of a man-child.

Stiller delivers a skilled performance playing Roger as a despondent in a fantastic slow burn, and it is unfortunate he couldn’t have done this in a better movie. Gerwig does what she can, though despite her plights, Florence doesn’t conjure much interest or, worse, sympathy. I understand what Baumbach wants to do with this story, and it just doesn’t succeed. It is wholly possible to create a rotten lead who exists amidst a larger whirl of events that keeps one’s attention. “Greenberg” offers little to distract the viewer from the tides of glum anger and misery.

Baumbach has already demonstrated that he can create engrossing films about unappealing characters in difficult situations. This time, though, rather than artfully depict boredom, he inflicts it.

Grade: C