Movie Review – Max Rose (2013)
Starring: Jerry Lewis, Dean Stockwell, Claire Bloom, Kelly Bishe, Rance Howard, Lee Weaver, Ileanna Douglas, Kevin Pollack, and Mort Stahl
Now I don’t mean to get this review off to a depressing start. But if there is one thing I have learned the past five years or so, it’s that grieving is a part of living, and everyone deals with it in their own way. In Max Rose, the new syrup filled attempt at a comeback by 90 year old Jerry Lewis, we learn that if you grieve long enough, you will also learn of extra-marital affairs, and maybe your 65 year marriage wasn’t the fairy tale you thought it was nor projected it to be.
As already stated, Max Rose stars Lewis as the title character recovering from the recent death of his wife Eva (a tremendous Bloom), and all his stages of grief are illustrated rather abruptly in this, longtime indie film producer Daniel Noah’s directorial debut. Yet the most amazing thing about Max Rose is that even though it clocks in at under 90 minutes, the film feels like it overstays its welcome.
This is by no means a knock on the tremendous cast Noah has put together, as his days as a producer have obviously garnered him a nice array of friends willing to help fulfill his vision. Pollack is always a joy to see onscreen, and his scenes in Max Rose are no different. In fact, he shares the most poignant scene of the movie with Lewis, as years of being the insignificant son of his father’s life come out in a diner scene that is acted imminently well. Lewis, who seems to be attempting the same type of late career renaissance Bruce Dern enjoyed with Nebraska, is off and on here. In some scenes, like the one mentioned above, his downtrodden character serves the story well, and his emoting toward Pollack makes for a good display of acting. Even an out of place montage of Max enjoying music with his newfound friends at a convalescent home, is good stuff. But for every one of these scenes, we have ones like the beginning of Max’s confrontation with the man his dead wife had an affair with all those years ago. It is so awkward that it is a miracle the scene eventually turns into something more than watchable.
But we are also privy to seeing odd scenes such as Max randomly mumbling to himself in a hallway and his granddaughter (an excellent Bishe) waking him up from the trance-like state he is in. Scenes like this are not only hard to watch for their acting. But Noah’s insistence to include them -his script is supposedly based on his own grandparents- with almost no payoff makes Max Rose an increasingly frustrating watch. Not to mention, Max’s inclusion in a convalescent home, for as many good scenes it contains, is handled rather abruptly with almost no explanation as to how the decision to put him there is made. Sure, we get it later on. But Noah and his editors really dropped the ball with this and many other of Max Rose‘s odd transitions.
The movie is not without its good points. Bishe is a revelation, and a master shot of Max speaking at his wife’s funeral, in which he proclaims his marriage to be a lie and his life to be a sham of unhappiness, are genuine highlights. But Max Rose is not unlike anything you haven’t seen before. While Noah may be thinking he is Alexander Payne, he comes off as a more privy to sap Nancy Meyers.
5.5 out of 10