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Harvey Karten's Reviews

Review: Adam

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#1 of 1 Posted 7/7/09 10:22 PM

From harveykarten Posts 774 Last 12:36 AM
To All [Msg # 23879.1 ]

ADAM

Fox Searchlight Pictures
Reviewed for CompuServe by Harvey Karten
Grade: B+
Directed by: Max Mayer
Written By: Max Mayer
Cast: Hugh Dancy, Rose Byrne, Peter Gallagher, Amy Irving, Frankie Faison, Mark Linn-Baker
Screened at: Dolby88, NYC, 7/7/09
Opens: July 29, 2009

If you’ve ever had the experience (and who hasn’t—sometimes many times in one day!) of speaking with a person who has no interest in anything about you but who delivers extended monologues about his or her own passions, you probably would not consider this fellow or woman to be anything but a bore. Given the way that psychologists and psychiatrists like to label any behavior that they find odd or self-centered to be neurotic—more money for their profession of course—you’d not be surprised to find out that the monologist may be an Aspie. Asperger’s Syndrome, an emotional condition that leads its often bright victims to be so unable to “read” the minds of others that they can talk on and on about train schedules, major-league baseball statistics and the universe as a whole, gives impetus to Max Mayer’s sophomore film “Adam.” Thank goodness that “Adam,” though centering on the title character’s emotional immaturity, is not a disease-of-the-week Hallmark presentation but an often funny as well as melancholic look into an improbably romantic relationship. Unlike the typical trajectory of romantic comedies, the parties do not follow the tired formula of being kept apart throughout the story until they bond happily in the conclusion. “Adam” is a solidly-written tale acted with particular grace by Hugh Dancy (“Confessions of a Shopaholic”) though at times it is marred by an unclear subplot involving the parents of Adam’s newly-found girlfriend.

Taking place in New York’s Central Park and environs, “Adam” follows its 29-year-old title character, who lives in a spacious Manhattan apartment, an electronics engineer who loses his job shortly after the death of his father. Faced with the fear of being forced to move if unable to pay the mortgage, he is comforted by Beth Buchwald (Rose Byrne), a new tenant who has recently ended a relationship with an investment banker who was favored by Beth’s dad, Marty Buchwald (Peter Gallagher) and mom, Rebecca (Amy Irving). Coached in the ways of young women by his good friend Harlan (Frankie Faison), Adam Raki has an on-and-off rapport with Beth, who is drawn to him despite his clumsiness, his compulsion to lecture people about astronomy, his inability to look folks in the eye.

In a key scene, while Adam is showing the planetarium he has created in his apartment, Beth is surprised by Adam’s first sincere show of physical affection for her. Beth, anxious about his dad’s upcoming trial for corporate wrongdoing (never too clear) and by her eagerness to find Adam “normal” and thereby available for potential marriage, is faced with a decision when Adam reaches a crossroads in his life.

Hugh Dancy, a British-born Oxford graduate, displays not only a credible American accent but, more important, a knack for subtly playing “Rain Man”/ “Being There” with comic verve and with only one melodramatic outburst. Dancy is a gem to behold. For her part Rose Byrne ditches traces of her Australian background to evoke the credibility of an elementary-school teacher who proves more than an adequate coach, seeking to prepare her bf with the necessary social graces to pass a job interview. As stated above, the principal dilemma is writer-director Mayer’s use of a subplot that is hardly needed, centering on a corporate crime whose tenor is undeveloped.

Christopher Lennertz’s score of indie-pop tunes provides uplift to a film which wisely, like so many others of its ilk, uses the Big Apple to advantage.

Rated PG-13. 97 minutes. © 2009 by Harvey Karten Member: NY Film Critics Online

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Harvey Karten's Reviews

Review: Adam

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