McConaugheMay Day 10: Thirteen Conversations About One Thing
Ten movies in and Matthew McConuaghey still has yet to exhibit true, undeniable, capital-S star power in ensemble casts. In Thirteen Conversations About One Thing, he’s playing to type as a charming, handsome hotshot who finds that he doesn't have the emotional core he always assumed he did have, but he can't quite play the character with enough texture to push it out of the New Yorker-y literary leanings of the script. Which is fine, to be honest, as I like that style. That’s a quality that is likely within my top three red flags as a person, if we're being totally honest. OI’m just always a sucker for the "these people have no idea how they interconnect in a shared space" gimmick.
As it stands, this film was directed by Jill Sprecher and written by Jill and her sister Karen Sprecher a few years after the former’s debut film Clockwatchers. The latter film is a sheer delight to watch, with standout performances from the Indie Queen Parker Posey, Toni Collette, and Lisa Kudrow, but a big part of that film’s appeal was in its condensed scope. It was about so much more than the plot, but the focus of the film was about three women trying to find meaning in their lives outside of their dead-end cubicle jobs. In Thirteen Conversations, Sprecher aims higher, trying to weave together disparate vignettes in New York into a grand and cohesive whole about life, love, sadness, and longing. While I respect the vision, it’s simply too much for a two hour movie to contain, and the ways in which the characters overlap comes at the expense of offering satisfying conclusions to most of the stories. While some have the tonal control and lasting moments of great short stories, others simply exist as set up for another vignette. Less thirteen conversations, and maybe more six conversations with some occasional digressions.
That said, Sprecher demonstrates some thoughtful control over the camera with each scene; New York feels sufficiently busy and filled with life, courtesy of cinematographer Dick Pope, who’s worked with plenty of auteurs from Richard Linklater to Mike Leigh. This is the type of film that would surprise you if you rented it from Hollywood Video (apologies for acknowledging my age here), and one that you might recommend to other indie film lovers. In a world where I sought it out purely out of completionist desire, it doesn’t quite have the same effect.
It’s somewhat fitting to watch a film about characters sleepwalking through their lives and trying to work so often and so hard that they never have to confront the screaming void inside them the day I hit double-digits in McConaugheMay. Would've watched this on the 13th for the bit but James needed to check it out from the library.
A delight to see young Rob McElhenney from It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia here in a small role! A Handsome guy, but he doesn't get to do anything funny here.