By Susan Granger
Special to WestportNow
Six-time Academy Award nominee Glenn Close opens the Oscar race with “The Wife,” a stunning portrayal of a long-suffering woman who’s fed up with standing in her celebrated husband’s shadow.
Her symbiotic story begins with the Castlemans in bed. Joan (Glenn Close) and her husband Joe (Jonathan Pryce) are eagerly awaiting an early morning phone call that confirms he’s won the 1992 Nobel Prize for Literature.
En route to the ceremony in Sweden, Joan recalls (in flashbacks) their road from Smith College to Stockholm.
In the late 1950s, she was an extraordinarily promising creative writing student who had an affair with pompous, philandering English Lit Professor Joe Castleman. And it was only after they were married that Joe’s distinguished career took off.
As Joan listens with a tight-lipped smile to people extolling Joe for reinventing the nature of storytelling, you can see her inscrutable face barely reflecting perceptible pride mixed with resentful bitterness, disbelief tinged by jealousy. Glenn Close’s nuanced performance is close to miraculous in its subtlety.
When asked what she does, placid Joan enigmatically replies, “I am a kingmaker.”
Only Joe’s persistently smarmy biographer, Nathaniel Bone (Christian Slater), guesses Joan’s secret complicity in Joe’s success.
“Don’t paint me as a victim,” she warns him. “I am much more interesting than that.” Indeed. She has sublimated her own ambitions to surreptitiously further his.
Credit screenwriter Jane Anderson for adapting Meg Wolitzer’s provocative 2003 novel into a calculating drama that unfolds with compelling suspense.
Director Bjorn Runge adds credibility by casting Close’s real-life daughter Annie Starke as young Joan with Max Irons (Jeremy’s son) as their son. Unfortunately, Harry Lloyd is not as convincing as young Joe.
FYI: Close was first Oscar-nominated as Robin Williams’ mother in “The World According to Garp” (1982). She earned other nominations for “The Big Chill” (1984), “The Natural” (1985), “Fatal Attraction” (1988), “Dangerous Liaisons” (1989) and “Albert Nobbs” (2012).
On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “The Wife” is a self-effacing, enabling 8. Glenn Close’s 7th nomination may be the charm.
In “Juliet, Naked,” Annie (Rose Byrne) manages a municipal history museum in Sandcliff, a British seaside town, while struggling to maintain her long-term relationship with Duncan (Chris O’Dowd), who is obsessed with ‘90s alternative-pop rocker Tucker Crowe (Ethan Hawke), now vanished into obscurity.
When an unreleased Tucker Crowe demo ‘Juliet, Naked’ arrives in the mail, Duncan is ecstatic. Sensible Annie is far more critical of the motley selection of outtakes, expressing her distaste in an acerbic comment on Duncan’s website.
To her surprise, Annie receives a personal reply from the reclusive musician himself, thanking her for disliking the bootleg CD as much as he does.
After a trans-Atlantic email flirtation, Tucker suddenly appears in Annie’s life, toting his adorable son Jackson (Azhy Robertson). The timing coincides with Duncan’s blossoming affair with a colleague named Gina (Denise Gough).
Based on Nick Hornby’s 2009 novel, it’s predictably adapted by Evgenia Peretz, Tamara Jenkins and Jim Taylor and directed by Evgenia’s brother, Jesse Peretz, the founding bass player with the 1980s American indie band Lemonheads, who went on to helm TV’s “Nurse Jackie,” among other series.
Ethan Hawke says, “For an actor, I’m not a bad singer.” But he’s not very good either. Genial, lighthearted faking doesn’t always resonate, even under the supervision of Nathan Larson, who scored and produced the music, featuring Robyn Hitchcock and Ryan Adams, among others.
On the other hand, Rose Byrne’s ditsy comic timing is remarkable.
On the Granger Gauge, “Juliet, Naked” is a superficially satirical, soulful 6. Nobody’s naked and Juliet’s nonexistent in this romantic comedy about life’s second chances.
After a brief appearance by “The Nun” in “Conjuring 2,” this is a spinoff, a supernatural prequel, set decades before she began haunting Connecticut’s ghost-hunter Lorraine Warren (Vera Farmiga).
After a nun commits suicide at a cloistered abbey in Biertan, Romania, in 1952, Father Anthony Burke (Demian Bichir) is summoned to Rome. He’s dispatched by the hierarchy of the Catholic Church to investigate the sacred sanctuary, accompanied by a young novitiate, Sister Irene (Vera’s real-life sister Taissa Farmiga), who has occult visions.
“I have orders from the Vatican to determine if the grounds are still holy,” he explains.
Taking a horse-drawn buggy to the dark, dank Abbey of St. Carta, a bombed-out medieval castle that is shunned by the superstitious villagers, they’re joined by Frenchie (Jonas Bloquet), the French Canadian fellow who discovered the gruesome corpse while delivering supplies to the abbey.
Apparently, two nuns confronted a demonic presence in a forbidden corner of the ancient building, an apparent portal to hell, where a sign proclaims: “God Ends Here.” One nun is consumed by darkness while the other hangs herself, still clutching a mysterious key.
The Abbess, whose face remains hidden behind a dark veil, isn’t much help, nor are the other screaming, terrified nuns, some of whom are set on fire, jangling their rosary beads in a prayer marathon.
Written by Gary Dauberman (“Annabelle” franchise) and directed by Corin Hardy (“The Hallow”), it’s decidedly mediocre, relying on ominous maneuvers like old-fashioned jump scares, crosses swiveling upside-down, radios that turn themselves on-and-off, writhing serpents and menacing shadows.
Not surprisingly, actress Bonnie Aarons is malevolently memorable as the titular, villainous Valak, who is determined to escape.
On the Granger Gauge, “The Nun” is a derivative 3, proving even bad horror movies conjure big box-office.
(Editor’s Note: Westport resident Susan Granger grew up in Hollywood, studied journalism with Pierre Salinger at Mills College, and graduated from the University of Pennsylvania with highest honors in journalism. In addition to writing for newspapers and magazines, she has been on radio/television as an anchorwoman and movie/drama critic for many years. See her reviews at www.susangranger.com.)
