Nicole Holofcener, it turns out, makes better Woody Allen movies than Woody Allen. Over the last decade, Holofcener has established herself as a force in independent cinema, making films about women at a time when precious few filmmakers seem to be doing so. She even directed a few episodes of the once-empowering Sex and the City, which has ironically become to condescending trash it once mocked.
Please Give, Holofcener’s fourth feature (1996’s Walking and Talking, 2001’s Lovely and Amazing and 2006’s Friends With Money before this), may well be her most accomplished, most well-rounded effort. Where it lacks in the uncomfortable bite of Lovely and Amazing it makes up for with stronger, more honest dialogue. Where it lacks in the outright comedy of Friends With Money, it makes up for in more organic laughs. Money felt too much like a sitcom too much of the time, not helped by the casting of Jennifer Aniston in the lead.
In Please Give, the casting is one of the most impressive elements. The closest thing to a lead character is Kate (Catherine Keener), an affluent wife and mother living in Manhattan. She owns a antique furniture shop on 10th Ave with her husband Alex (Oliver Platt). They’ve bought the neighboring apartment to theirs, which is occupied by an old grandmother (Ann Morgan Guilbert) who just won’t die. Her granddaughter Rebecca (Rebecca Hall) takes care of her while her other granddaughter, Mary (Amanda Peet), is only concerned about taking care of herself.
Platt’s outnumbered here, and how refreshing that is. We see women deal with their own problems sans men, suggesting *gasp* that women are independently-thinking beings with doubts and regret and ambitions.
New York City is the setting here and certainly the most noticeable of any location in a Holofcener picture. That said, it never overshadows Kate’s see-sawing, guilt-ridden life goals or Rebecca’s maternal confusion. Kate can’t be happy with success because said success comes from the deaths of others. She gives every homeless person on the street cash, as a means to cleanse her soul. Meanwhile, Rebecca can’t start living her own life because her grandmother, who raised her, can’t stop living hers. Meanwhile, both are surrounded by people who seem perfectly content in the same, respective situations. At one point, a customer at the antique store asks Alex and Kate where they find all of their furniture. “We buy from the children of dead people,” Alex snarls. His cynicism is bright and without regret, while Kate’s is like a wound that won’t close.
Sarah Steele plays the couple’s insecure, brutally-entitled daughter Abby. Steele’s playing the same part she played a few years back in James L. Brooks’ Spanglish, and she does about as well. It’ll be nice to see her move up and out of the cinematic teenage years. She’s already 22 years old and should fare well as an adult.
Peet’s one of the standouts throughout, providing some of the darkest, fullest laughs in the picture during a brutal dinner scene between Kate and Rebecca’s respective families. While the grandmother sits at the same dinner table, Peet’s Mary asks Kate and Alex what they plan to do with the apartment after she dies. Though the couple resists at first, and Rebecca protests (of course), they eventually go into detail about their planned renovation. Kate goes so far as to say, “I can’t wait.” It’s wrong, but true.
And so the film moves from hard-edged comedy to inescapable drama. We learn about these women the way you learn about your family once you’re old enough to be told everything, warts and all. It stings for a bit, but, in the end, you’re glad someone told you the truth.
Have you seen Please Give? What do you think of Holofcener as a filmmaker?