Grandma' is a film about a grandma and her granddaughter. Sage (Julia Garner) visits her grandma (lily Tomlin) seemingly on a whim. Turns out Sage has gotten herself pregnant and has decided to abort the child. Tight on money she opts to go past her mother and ask her Grandmother for a $600 loan. Of course she is out of money as well so, the two travel the town pulling in favors and claiming debts. With a plot line such as this, the filmmakers are almost forced to make this a character study. The focus of the study is on Tomlins character. The problem is, this character doesn't work. At all. It's unfortunate how little character is actually present here.
Considering that Tomlin being on the receiving end of so much award show buzz for her performance. If there is one thing that I could point to and say that, that was the overall issue it would its run time. The film runs at less than an hour and twenty minutes long. For a reference, 'Taken 2' runs longer than this movie does.
Having such a short run time like this for a character study is extremely problematic. It feels TOO streamlined. Which is strange to say considering so many movies out there are so messy that its near impossible to decipher them. But this one doesn't allow you to actually get invested in these characters.
Sage and her grandma are such incredibly flat characters that this ultra short run time actually feels like a stretch. They go some place and Tomlin yells at some people while Garner sits quietly in the background. There just isn't enough substance here to make a meaningful film out of. This is made even worse by the fact that, it has every opportunity to make a powerful film.
As these two venture around the town seeing old friends and love ones the past is brought up quite a bit. It's in these scenes that the film should've fleshed out the main characters. We learn about this womans back story as Sage does, slow and steady, but we just don't learn enough. We see that these two aren't that much different but the film struggles to show how this is impacting this young girl. The film tells us her back story but it does it as if it where explaining to a child. No emotion or power behind it at all.
By the end I desperately wanted to connect with these to women but I just couldn't. They go on a "life altering" journey together but we don't learn about why it was life altering. We don't know why this old lady acts the way she does, she just does. For no apparent reason. It would've been so easy to write this in such a way that we learn about some of the tings she did and why. But, more times then not, we don't get the why. Just the how, which if you ask me, is far less interesting.
However, there are many things to like here. Not being able to connect the characters may make things difficult but the sassy writing Tomlin is given is hilarious. She is rude, foul mouthed, and stuck up. And I loved it. Her performance may have been a bit wonky at times but her dialogue was spot on. Not to mention an all around good looking movie.
'Grandma' may not be the expertly crafted, Oscar worthy movie that it is being held up as. But Tomlin in the lead role coupled with solid writing can make for a genuinely funny film. It's to bad that almost everything else the film does trips itself up. Some shoddy character molding, a weak story, and an incredibly short run time really stiffen this overall playful film up.
Considering that Tomlin being on the receiving end of so much award show buzz for her performance. If there is one thing that I could point to and say that, that was the overall issue it would its run time. The film runs at less than an hour and twenty minutes long. For a reference, 'Taken 2' runs longer than this movie does.
Having such a short run time like this for a character study is extremely problematic. It feels TOO streamlined. Which is strange to say considering so many movies out there are so messy that its near impossible to decipher them. But this one doesn't allow you to actually get invested in these characters.
Sage and her grandma are such incredibly flat characters that this ultra short run time actually feels like a stretch. They go some place and Tomlin yells at some people while Garner sits quietly in the background. There just isn't enough substance here to make a meaningful film out of. This is made even worse by the fact that, it has every opportunity to make a powerful film.
As these two venture around the town seeing old friends and love ones the past is brought up quite a bit. It's in these scenes that the film should've fleshed out the main characters. We learn about this womans back story as Sage does, slow and steady, but we just don't learn enough. We see that these two aren't that much different but the film struggles to show how this is impacting this young girl. The film tells us her back story but it does it as if it where explaining to a child. No emotion or power behind it at all.
By the end I desperately wanted to connect with these to women but I just couldn't. They go on a "life altering" journey together but we don't learn about why it was life altering. We don't know why this old lady acts the way she does, she just does. For no apparent reason. It would've been so easy to write this in such a way that we learn about some of the tings she did and why. But, more times then not, we don't get the why. Just the how, which if you ask me, is far less interesting.
However, there are many things to like here. Not being able to connect the characters may make things difficult but the sassy writing Tomlin is given is hilarious. She is rude, foul mouthed, and stuck up. And I loved it. Her performance may have been a bit wonky at times but her dialogue was spot on. Not to mention an all around good looking movie.
'Grandma' may not be the expertly crafted, Oscar worthy movie that it is being held up as. But Tomlin in the lead role coupled with solid writing can make for a genuinely funny film. It's to bad that almost everything else the film does trips itself up. Some shoddy character molding, a weak story, and an incredibly short run time really stiffen this overall playful film up.