If there were a contest for ranking the best movies about a cliché older man, womanizing young women and living a morally lightweight life, then SOLITARY MAN may prove to be a top contender. However, I would venture to guess few of us are looking for such a film, especially one that generally lacks any redeeming power or sustainably successful comedy.
SOLITARY MAN is a dry, flat drama with little humor and lacks a clear purpose. The film, co-directed by Brian Koppelman and David Levien, presents itself as a slice of life story of an aging man, once rich and powerful, now struggling to rebuild his former life after crashing and burning by his own hands.
Michael Douglas plays Ben Kalmen, a former highly successful and respected automobile dealer who owner several major franchise lots. After an unexpected scare at a routine annual checkup, Kalmen responds by fleeing his once solid moral character, seeking risk in his life where he had not before. In essence, Kalmen begins tempting fate through his career and his marriage.
Having lost everything, Kalmen finds out just how good his high society friends are when he’s down and out. He continues to pursue his flirtatious philandering with women young enough to be his grandchildren, but to a diminishing degree of effectiveness. Along with a series of encounters with the supporting characters, this evokes a number of micro-epiphanies in Kalmen’s life.
These moments of epiphany are conceptualized by a sudden and complete silence, filled only with an ambient void, as the camera fixates on Kalmen’s emotional expression. Being a nice, subtle touch, the only other element I found myself particularly fond of in the film was the opening, which features Kalmen stepping out into the city dressed in black, head to toe, just as Johnny “The Man in Black” Cash had done, set to Cash’s song Solitary Man. Unfortunately, this minimal level of creative vision dissipates fast into what becomes a film that tests the audience’s patience with little reward.
While the film’s lack of direction and significant message is a disappointing flaw, SOLITARY MAN does have one thing worth it’s salt… Michael Douglas’ performance carries the film. One would be hard pressed to think of another actor that could take as cliché of a role, as unlikable a character, and make it as engaging and believable in the way Douglas’ cadence fittingly draws the viewer’s attention into his slightly twisted, somewhat pathetic world. It’s too bad, however, that this isn’t enough to save the film as a whole.
SOLITARY MAN feature a notable supporting cast, including Susan Sarandon as Kalmen’s first ex-wife, Danny Devito as perhaps Kalmen’s only real friend, Jesse Eisenberg as Daniel Cheston, a nerdy college student that Kalmen attempts to “reform” into a successful ladies’ man, and Imogen Poots as Allyson, the daughter of Kalmen’s girlfriend Jordan, some twenty years his junior.
Saradon and Devito deliver respectable performances, as does Eisenberg… even though it’s primarily his typical modus operandis. Imogen Poots’ performance isn’t so much commendable as it is a bit shocking, central to a key point in the story that shifts everything in Kalmen’s life, although questionably overdrawn with taboo, ultimately reducing it’s dramatic punch in favor of jaw-dropping disbelief. Jenna Fischer’s performance is also noteworthy, however brief and relatively insignificant to the story.
As for Mary-Louise Parker, who plays Kalmen’s forty-something girlfriend, her performance is flat and distracting, until her final scene when she shifts her character’s personality so much the sudden icy cold dramatic boost seems unlikely and out of place, given the character’s previous scenes. This is a trend that permeates SOLITARY MAN, underdevelopment of empathy towards the characters and a certain hollowness about the tone and progression of the story that leaves the audience feeling cheated, perhaps even emotionally short-changed.
SOLITARY MAN is not a film that delivers much originality, is surprisingly uneventful and often just slow enough have some in the audience waning consciousness. Given Douglas’ performance, the film isn’t an entire loss, but the odds for a positive movie going experience from SOLITARY MAN are about as good as Ben Kalmen reestablishing himself as the “most honest dealer in town”.
