Apparently directors Jay and Mark Duplass cried all the way through the premiere of their film. Frankly I know how they felt.
It’s not a disaster by any means, but the most disappointing thing about Jeff is how stunningly average and predictable it is. Clearly belonging to the current crop of indie dramas featuring slacker losers as the main characters, it has the check list you’d expect. Goofy hoodie-wearing stoner lead? Yup. Kooky mum? Absolutely. Irritating brother? Oh yes.
It’s clearly time for the Judd Atapow crew to try different things. Seth Rogen had a go in Take This Waltz, as did Steve Carell in The End Of The World, with varied results. Now it’s Jason Segal’s turn. While he managed to pull off being a sad sack in Forgetting Sarah Marshall, here he is faced with a bigger task, being sympathetic and interesting playing a lonely thirtysomething living in his mum’s basement. In Forgetting he had a script with lots of gags, good actors surrounding him and a couple of very funny songs to sing.
Jeff is clearly a sad loser, our first sight of him is sucking weed on a huge bong before moaning about being sent out to get some wood glue. He obsessed about the name Kevin, is convinced everything happens for a reason and watches the film Signs over and over again.
Even his own family find him annoying. Mum Susan Sarandon is fed up with ringing him up to get him to do the most basic chores, and is only partially cheered up by the anonymous messages she is getting from a work admirer. Brother Pat (Ed Helms of the US Office fame) considers himself the success of the family after all he’s got a mortgage, a wife and a job, but when he spends money the family doesn’t have on a Porsche his life gradually falls apart, and he needs Jeff’s help to get himself back on track. Jeff can’t believe his luck when he discovers they have both been having the same dream.
Low-fi indie films may not have explosions or special effects to grab the attention, what they do have are words after all, talk is cheap. Here though there is so little to get a grasp on any of the characters there are no real jokes, just some rather feeble and irritating running gags about Pat’s car and endless references to Signs. Jeff’s insistence there is order in this chaotic old world irritates even him in the end, and even the great Sarandon has so little to work with in her role as the put-upon hard-working mum, who would be totally forgiven for giving her lazy son a kick up the behind.
A final memo to the directors the hand-held look, with the camera zooming in and out of faces while they blather endlessly to make it all look spontaneous, doesn’t work. In fact it’s really distracting and after half an hour plain headache-inducing. Also an indie film deserves an indie soundtrack, which means Pavement or Sonic Youth, not 1970s disco.
Overall verdict: If you’re in an extremely forgiving mood and like your stories almost catatonic this might be for you, otherwise it’s worth a miss.
Special Features:
Trailer
Directors’ interviews
Reviewer: Mike Martin