LIFE UPSIDE DOWN
(director/writer: Cecilia Miniucchi; editor: Anne Goursaud; music: Charles Dobney; cast: Bob Oderkirk (Jonathan Wigglesworth), Cyrus Pahlavi (Darius), Radha Mitchell (Clarisa Cranes), Danny Huston (Paul Hasselberg), Rosie Fellner (Rita Hasselberg), Terence Bernie Hines (George). (Wife, Sue Wigglesworth); Runtime: 88; MPAA Rating: NR; producers: Carl F. Berg/Jeffrey Coulter/Rose Kuo/Jason Rose/Cecilia MiniucchWi; IFC Films; 2023)
“The witless story is a drag.”
Reviewed by Dennis Schwartz
Cecilia Miniucchi (“Expired”/”Life in America”) is the writer-director of this clunky movie shot during the summer COVID period of 2020.
Jonathan Wigglesworth (Bob Oderkirk) is an abstract artist who owns a struggling art gallery in Los Angeles. The scumbag cheats on his clueless wife Sue (Jeanie Lim) with the lonely single college professor Clarissa Cranes (Radha Mitchell).They have twin boys who are away at college.
The middle-aged ex-colleague of Clarissa, a noted writer, Paul Hasselberg (Danny Huston), changes his mind about buying a painting from Jonathan because of the pandemic. Paul is in a loveless marriage with his airhead younger trophy wife Rita (Rosie Fellner).
The unfocused Clarissa flirts with her weird younger tenant Darius (Cyrus Pahlavi), whom she sublets her guest house to.
Since none of the characters are fully developed, witty, have any depth or are worth caring about, it’s hard for us to care about any of them and their superficial problems. If set in Manhattan, this simple urban plot among the neurotic sophisticates would have been a layup for Woody Allen.
The witless story is a drag and the performances are flat, what works, if you may, is how the technology (it’s shot on smartphones, therefore no credited cinematographer) is applied to the situations.
REVIEWED ON 1/30/2023 GRADE: C