In 'Wonder Wheel,' Woody Allen's latest, the characters are too thinly drawn
A fresh Woody Allen movie arrives practically every year like clockwork. Some are good 鈥� most are middling. Being prolific isn鈥檛 a crime, but with Allen, what you often get are retreads dolled up to look brand-new.
鈥淲onder Wheel鈥� is set in Brooklyn鈥檚 Coney Island amusement park in the late 1950s, and so one might expect it to be more 鈥減ersonal鈥� to this Brooklynite auteur than some of his other films. But it turns out that the main reason Allen likely chose this location is for its visual allure: With the help of his cinematographer, Vittorio Storaro, he gets to turn the boardwalk into a candy-
colored, eye-popping fantasia. From a purely thematic standpoint, this 鈥渓ook鈥� makes little sense, but it sure is nice to gaze upon. It takes one鈥檚 mind off the theatrics, which are often less than galvanizing.
Ginny (Kate Winslet) and her husband, Humpty (Jim Belushi), live right on the boardwalk in a makeshift apartment. She鈥檚 a waitress in a clam house; he operates the carousel. She was once married to a drummer and had ambitions to be an actress. In a sense, she鈥檚 still an actress; she overemotes constantly and turns even the simplest domestic spat into high drama. It鈥檚 not entirely believable that she would have taken up with the kindhearted but boorish Humpty, whom she is constantly keeping away from the booze.聽
Into their lives comes Carolina (Juno Temple), Humpty鈥檚 daughter from a previous marriage, who is on the run from her gangster husband. Since she and her father have long been estranged, she figures his boardwalk home is the last place the pursuing mobsters will think to look.聽
It doesn鈥檛 take long before Humpty and Carolina are reconciled 鈥� he declares that she was 鈥渢he light of [his] life.鈥� Ginny, meantime, is romanced by Mickey (a miscast Justin Timberlake), the local lifeguard. It is Mickey who acts as the audience鈥檚 tour guide of this menagerie. He鈥檚 a Lothario without really coming on like one. Having served time in the Navy, he attends New York University graduate school and fancies himself a budding playwright. He gives Carolina a present of Ernest Jones鈥檚 psychoanalytic study 鈥淗amlet and Oedipus鈥� 鈥� can there be any more perfect gift in a Woody Allen movie? 鈥� and makes a point of looking for the 鈥済reat tragic flaw鈥� in the classic plays and also in the lives of the people with whom he surrounds himself.聽
This, of course, is a tip-off that the people in 鈥淲onder Wheel,鈥� most pointedly Ginny, are all flawed in ways that will upend their lives. The exception is Mickey, who blithely carries on with Ginny, and then with Carolina, who has no idea that Mickey is two-timing her with her stepmother. Mickey floats above it all.
In a film like 鈥淐rimes and Misdemeanors,鈥� probably Allen鈥檚 best and darkest 鈥減hilosophical鈥� movie, the questions of guilt and morality play out in ways that deeply resonate with the characters. In 鈥淲onder Wheel,鈥� the characters are too thinly drawn to support all that cranky fatalism that Allen specializes in. And this includes Winslet鈥檚 Ginny, who in some ways comes across like Blanche DuBois from Tennessee Williams鈥檚 鈥淎 Streetcar Named Desire,鈥� but without the poetry or the pathos. Ginny, instead, specializes in headaches. Allen has summoned up Williams鈥檚 play before, in the overrated 鈥淏lue Jasmine,鈥� where it was Cate Blanchett鈥檚 turn to do a variation on Blanche. But movies don鈥檛 become great by association, and 鈥淲onder Wheel鈥� is a far cry from 鈥淪treetcar.鈥� There are ample flaws in this film, but they certainly don鈥檛 rise to the level of tragic.聽Grade: B- (Rated PG-13 for thematic content including some sexuality, language, and smoking.)
