ONCE UPON A NEIGHBORHOOD // A FILM REVIEW OF "FUNNY FACE"
FUNNY FACE, the new drama by Tim Sutton and NOT the Audrey Hepburn 1957 classic, is a dark view into capitalism and the ever changing New York landscape and skyline through the eyes of a man in a mask. Not quite a superhero mask, though. This mask basically looks like the huge grinning smile of the Coney Island mascot. Saul (Cosmo Jarvis) lives in Brooklyn with his parents and seems to be drifting through his own existence (and city). He leaves threatening messages at a local developer (Jonny Lee Miller) who is responsible for kicking his family out of their home. He sometimes puts on the Grinning Man mask, to hide away while he roams. He wants revenge or payback, but doesn't know exactly how or what that even means to him. He's a man filled with anger, spending his days lingering around the city and listening to the Knicks. He seems to hate his existence, or at least hate the cards that life has dealt him.
Eventually he meets another New Yorker who's angry at their place in life: Zama (Dela Meskienyar), a young Muslim woman who rebels against the restrictions that her Aunt and Uncle lay out at every chance she gets. She wants to go dancing, to experience life and she feels claustrophobic when she's around them. They first meet at the bodega that Saul works at. She tries to steal some food and instead of turning her in, he stops her and gives her the money to pay for it. It's a strange meet cute, but one that seems completely at home in this dreamlike vision of NYC. Intrigued by him, they start walking the city together, spending time not really getting to know each other but spending time together exploring, even stealing a car together. They seem to find a peace within each other, never abandoning each other, even when one explodes in anger or flirts with violence.
Their dreamlike state of exploration is set alongside Jonny Lee Miller's unnamed developer's world of luxury, decadence, greed and sadness. He seems bored with his existence but angry that he's not more in control of it. We see a long shot of him sitting in a chair, staring blankly and angrily out at the world while three women climb over him, stripping while they do so. They end up spending more time with each other than him, as he seems completely bored of the entire charade. He's a son standing in the shadow of his father (Victor Garber), filthy rich with developments in the works and a city of middle class residents who hate him. Just like Saul, he's angry and unsure of his place in this city but unlike Saul, he has the money to change things at a snap of a finger (and a backroom deal or two). The cinematography by Lucas Gath is stunning, breathtaking with nearly every shot (one image that follows Zama's torn and worn down shoes into a wall of brand new sneakers is one of many inspired shots).
FUNNY FACE takes a grim look of a beautiful city and how capitalism sometimes morphs it into something new and completely different. Neither Cosmo nor the real estate developer fully understand the complicated world they live in and the different sides of the anger coin they flip has so much in common, even if they are on different sides of the argument. One yearns for the old days, the other yearns for only the future potential of a city they see in need of improvement. It's a hypnotic film, one that relies less on a narrative but rather on the emotions the characters feel from minute to minute and how the surrounding neighborhood effects their every move. Jarvis and Meskienyar are a wonderfully matched odd couple and the fact that they are so drawn to each other without ever wanting to explore the notion of "knowing each other" makes it more fascinating to watch than most inseparable pairs on screen. Jonny Lee Miller is explosive and dynamic, often looking like he's been drawn into a panel of a dark graphic novel. The world writer/director Tim Sutton explores has no easy answers and is smart enough to know it's only going to find more questions than answers. So instead, we wander and exerience the moment. After all, what else do we have other than this moment?
GRADE: A-
WRITTEN AND DIRECTED BY Tim Sutton STARRING Cosmo Jarvis, Dela Meskienyar, Jonny Lee Miller, Victor Garber, Dan Hedaya, Rhea Perlman, Jeremy Bobb. NOW PLAYING IN SELECT THEATRES AND ON VOD.