Dear Evan Hansen Review

Dear Evan Hansen

Dir: Stephen Chbosky

Starring: Ben Platt, Kaitlyn Dever, Amy Adams, Danny Pino, Nik Dodani, Julianne Moore, and Colton Ryan

2h 17m

 

"Dear Evan Hansen" makes its way from the stage to the screen, banking on its Tony award-winning success to translate its problematic subject matter into a moving musical movie sensation. 

 

Director Stephen Chbosky, who is no stranger to youth-focused drama, having directed "The Perks of Being a Wallflower" and "Wonder," has the unenviable task of adapting the stage content for the movie theater. It proves a tremendously difficult task as "Dear Evan Hansen," a story about adolescent mental-health concerns translated with musical numbers and teen rom-com sentiments, fails in finding its emotional pulse. 

 

The film opens with a teenage Evan Hansen (Ben Platt) writing a therapy-assigned letter addressed to himself. Evan, struggling with crippling social anxiety, among other undisclosed mental-health concerns, is reframing with positive affirmations about his final first day of high school. After being yelled at by a volatile classmate named Connor (Colton Ryan), Evan retreats into his loneliness, an existence of yearning for the girl he likes to notice him, eating lunches alone, and trying desperately to be more than just an invisible face in the crowd. 

 

One of Evan's self-addressed letters finds its way into the hands of Connor, who again challenges Evan in front of all their peers. The next day Evan is called into the principal's office and is informed that Connor took his own life. Connor's parents' (Amy Adams and Danny Pino) only clue is one of Evan's self-addressed letters. Believing Evan was Connor's only friend, the parents begin asking Evan questions about their relationship. Evan untruthfully fabricates a story that initiates a series of lies that grow greater as Evan propels into popularity. 

 

"Dear Evan Hansen" is a problematic film. The handling of a narrative centered on mental-health concerns for young people builds a complicated character at the core of its story. It asks the viewer to sympathize with a young person who manipulates a tragic situation. Along the bumpy path, Evan leads two grieving parents into falsehoods surrounding their deceased son while also using the problem to gain time and attention from the girl he has a crush on, who also happens to be the sibling of the boy who took his own life. 

 

The narrative handles issues of suicide, grieving, loneliness, and the impacts of social media on mental-health concerns with surface-level exploration. It's neither meaningful nor thought-provoking when the characters are offered minimal time to explore some of these concerns. It is often undercut by a musical number that pulls the emotion away from young people simply being honest with one another. It's troublesome, difficult to watch at times, and leads to a finale that doesn't feel at all earned. 

 

Ben Platt, reprising the stage role, is an excellent performer with a beautiful voice, but he doesn't pull off the look of a high school student. Platt has a few shining moments, primarily when tasked with carrying a musical number. Still, the subtle performance pieces surrounding the character's struggle and motivation are lost in the superficial narrative. Kaitlyn Dever, playing Evan's love interest Zoe, does an excellent job of balancing grief and hope. Playing Evan's mother, Heidi, Julianne Moore mostly disappears for much of the film but in her small moments provides a sense of gravity when questioning her son and a tender sensibility found in her struggle as a single mom. 

 

"Dear Evan Hansen" offers a few moments to discuss issues of mental health for young people. Most of these scenes happen between two characters, sometimes one sole character, with minimal emphasis on showy dance routines and without heavy-handed emotional coercion. Within these small, quiet scenes, the film brings valuable attention and an important message to the conversations surrounding depression, loneliness, grief, and coping with negative feelings. I wish there were more of this. Unfortunately, much of the adapted stage sensation fails to connect meaningfully with the situation and emotions found in the source material. 

 

Monte's Rating

2.25 out of 5.00

Fences Review

Fences

Dir: Denzel Washington

Starring: Denzel Washington, Viola Davis, Mykelti Williamson, Jovan Adepo, Russell Hornsby, and Stephen McKinley Henderson

Have you ever met someone who can tell stories with such flare and emotion that it feels like you are in that exact moment? Someone who can inspire a group of people with meaningful and honest messages of encouragement? Someone who can bring the house to its knees in laughter with yarns that connect into amusing, hilarious insights of everyday life? These people fascinate me because of their undeniable talent to command a room of people with such natural authority.

American playwright August Wilson, an exceptionally talented author, wrote a character that you could describe as one of these “great conversationalists” in a play called “Fences”. The character, Troy Maxson, is a charismatic man with strong ideas and perceptions about the world around him and the world that has and will shape his future. Troy is a difficult character to like, but he is undeniably riveting to listen to.

Denzel Washington, reprising the role he established in the stage adaptation a few years ago, plays Troy Maxson. However, Mr. Washington is doing more than just acting, he also directed this film. Also reprising her role from the play is Viola Davis, playing a beautiful and thoughtful woman, mother, wife who loves her family and makes Troy a better man than he actually is. “Fences” is a film that operates within set boundaries, much like its title insinuates, and it places the viewer in the middle of a family dynamic that lumbers and crumbles under the stress of past woes, selfish decisions, and the pursuit for the happiness that motivates the American dream.

We are introduced to Troy Maxson (Denzel Washington), waxing and jabbing with his best friend Bono (Stephen McKinley Henderson) about their job as sanitation workers, their lives as husbands and fathers, and the past that has solidified their relationship with such a fierce bond that underneath every mean spirited joke and personal stab you can feel the kind of love that comes with shared experiences both good and bad. Troy’s wife Rose (Viola Davis) is the glue that holds her family together, a woman who adores her husband amidst the knowledge that everything in their relationship, and with their family, is not the best that it could be.

“Fences” was adapted from a play, but Mr. Washington doesn’t allow the constraints within that structure to keep him from expanding the limits. By no means does the film have flashy photography or offer technical flare; instead Mr. Washington establishes a parameter, the inside of the house, the confines of the backyard, the sidewalks and road of the street Troy walks home on. Within these boundaries Mr. Washington displays the American dream for a family that experienced the social injustices that tarnished their pursuit of that dream. Troy is still weary and angry from these experiences, he was a baseball player that peaked before Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier and a sanitation worker who believes that being a driver is meant for people of a different color than him. While these experiences are never shown, Troy discusses them with such intricacy and passion that you can see these scenes formulate from his words. Still, this harsh mentality about the world saturates every decision he makes with his family. His youngest son Cory (Jovan Adepo), who plays football and is vying for scholarship to play in college, is challenged on numerous occasions in a similar fashion as when Troy discusses how bad a baseball player Jackie Robinson was. It starts as part tough love but moves into something that feels like bullying. Troy’s other son Lyon (Russell Hornsby), who is a struggling musician, is also belittled for wanting to borrow money and then later in the film denied the opportunity to pay his father back because of Troy’s pride. It’s within these moments with family where we begin to see the charismatic talker, who boasts about fighting the devil and hitting homeruns, show his true colors. In a heartbreaking scene and performance from Viola Davis, Rose confronts her husband who has just boasted about another woman, complained about his home life, and offered regrets about why the world has passed him by. Through a flow of tears, she asks him the question “What about my life, what about my dreams?” and Troy has no response.

“Fences” is never an easy film, it asks complicated questions and insists that you try and see the world throw the eyes of the characters. This sometimes offers valuable insight, like when Troy discusses why he “likes” his son, and at other times confuses, like when Rose complaisantly accepts an unimaginable responsibility because of Troy’s selfishness. Still, great characters should make these aspects of life difficult to understand, it’s easy to say that we would respond differently but it’s never that easy in the moment. That’s the accomplishment that Mr. Washington achieves in “Fences”, making the murky and thorny choices these characters make resonate so emotionally long after the film ends.

Monte’s Rating

4.00 out of 5.00