Mila Kunis Archives – CULTURE MIX

Review: ‘Goodrich,’ starring Michael Keaton, Mila Kunis, Carmen Ejogo, Michael Urie, Kevin Pollak, Vivien Lyra Blair, Laura Benanti and Andie MacDowell

October 24, 2024

by Carla Hay

Jacob Kopera, Michael Keaton and Vivien Lyra Blair in “Goodrich” (Photo courtesy of Ketchup Entertainment)

Directed by Hallie Meyers-Shyer

Culture Representation: Taking place in the Los Angeles area, the comedy/drama film “Goodrich” features a predominantly white cast of characters (with a few African Americans and Asians) representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.

Culture Clash: A workaholic gallery owner, whose longtime business is on the verge of failing, has to raise his 9-year-old twins on his own while his estranged wife is in rehab and his 36-year-old daughter from a previous marriage is about to give birth to her first child.

Culture Audience: “Goodrich” will appeal mainly to people who are fans of the movie’s headliners and well-acted comedies/dramas about families going through emotionally difficult transitions.

Michael Keaton and Mila Kunis in “Goodrich” (Photo courtesy of Ketchup Entertainment)

“Goodrich” is a sprawling, uneven comedy/drama about a workaholic art gallery owner with turmoil in his personal life and professional life. The cast members’ believable performances improve a story that sometimes wanders too much. “Goodrich” portrays adult issues in realistic ways. But to its detriment, the movie has some scenes that don’t serve much purpose except being filler.

Written and directed by Hallie Meyers-Shyer, “Goodrich” is the type of movie that typically doesn’t get a theatrical release and is more likely to be a direct-to-video release or an original movie from a streaming service. That’s because it’s becoming increasingly uncommon for U.S.-based live-action movies about family problems to get a theatrical release unless the focus of the movie is on the children in the family. It’s even more uncommon for the protagonist to be an elderly father who’s raising pre-teen children on his own.

“Goodrich” (which was filmed on location in the Los Angeles area) takes place over a three-month period, from September to December. The story is told from the perspective of protagonist Andy Goodrich (played by Michael Keaton), the owner of Goodrich Gallery, a boutique art gallery in Los Angeles that has been in business for about 28 years. Andy, who is his early 70s, is so preoccupied with his work, he tends to not notice things that are going on in his immediate family. Throughout the movie, it’s implied that his workaholic ways were the main reason why his first marriage ended in divorce.

Andy thinks he’s a good guy, but there are huge indications that he’s self-absorbed and has made his job the top priority in his life for a very long time. The movie’s opening scene shows Andy getting a phone call late at night when he’s at home. The call is from his second and current wife Naomi Parsons (played by Laura Benanti), who announces that she has checked into a 90-day rehab program at a recovery center called Journeys because of her addictions to alcohol and pills. (Naomi isn’t seen in the movie until the last 15 minutes.)

Andy is shocked because he wasn’t even aware that Naomi has these addictions. He tells her that he just thought that she sometimes drank too much alcohol. Naomi is annoyed but not surprised. “Didn’t you notice that I didn’t come home?” Naomi asks Andy, who admits that he hadn’t really noticed. Naomi then drops another bombshell on Andy when she announces to him: “I’m leaving you.”

Naomi and Andy are parents to 9-year-old twins: daughter Billie (played by Vivien Lyra Blair) and son Mose (played by Jacob Kopera), who don’t know that Naomi is in rehab. Billie is the more talkative and more intuitive twin. She’s also more emotionally mature than her brother.

Andy doesn’t know how to handle the sudden responsibility of being the primary caregiver parent for the twins. And he doesn’t want to tell them the truth about why they won’t be able to see Naomi for the next 90 days. And so, the next morning, Andy lies by telling Billie and Mose that Naomi has a doctor’s appointment.

Andy has a part-time housekeeper named Tali (played by Noa Fisher), who is helpful, but she’s not really a nanny. Now that Andy is the primary caregiver for the kids, he’s been thrown into a situation where he has no idea what the kids’ daily routines are and what they might need when they’re at school, at home, or elsewhere. Naomi didn’t leave any instructions for him before she checked into rehab.

Still in denial that Naomi is in long-term rehab, Andy drives to Promises, where he is told Naomi gave the rehab center strict orders not to let Andy see her or communicate with her while she’s in rehab. He is shocked and angry but that anger turns into confusion and remorse. Andy continues to lie to Billie and Mose about where Naomi is.

Andy changes his story to say that Naomi is visiting her mother in St. Louis, and he’s not sure when Naomi will come home. The twins are worried but they trust what Andy tells them. Andy doesn’t want the twins to know the truth because he thinks it would be too traumatic for Billie and Mose. But the reality is that Andy doesn’t want to completely face the truth himself, partly because of the guilt and shame he feels over the whole situation.

Later in the movie, it’s shown that Andy’s voice mail messages to Naomi go unreturned. The letters he sends to Naomi are sent back as “return to sender” letters. Andy finds out that Naomi has called Billie and Mose and told the same lie about visiting her mother in St. Louis, in order to keep up the charade. Even after all of these signs that Naomi wants to end the marriage, Andy still thinks that Naomi will change her mind when she’s out of rehab.

Meanwhile, Andy’s eldest child is his 36-year-old daughter Grace (played by Mila Kunis), who is going through a very different type of parental issue: In the beginning of the movie, Grace is about seven months pregnant with her first child. Grace is a senior entertainment writer at an unnamed media outlet. She’s married to mild-mannered Pete (played by Danny Deferrari), a doctor who is an ear/nose/throat specialist. Pete and Grace both do not want to know the gender of their unborn child until the baby is born.

Grace and Pete are first seen during an appointment with Grace’s obstetrician/gynecologist Dr. Verma (played by Poorna Jagannathan), who talks about some dietary concerns that Grace is having. Before Dr. Verma enters the exam room, Grace confides in Pete (who is a very supportive and loving husband) that she doesn’t know why she feels she might get fired if she asks her female boss to go on extended maternity leave. Grace is struggling with deciding if she wants to quit her job to become a full-time homemaker.

Andy’s relationship with Grace has had its share of ups and downs. He was a mostly absentee parent to Grace after he got divorced from Grace’s mother Ann (played by Andie MacDowell), who is currently director of the Walton Museum in downtown Los Angeles. Ann and Andy were married for 14 years. All of this information about Andy’s previous marriage isn’t revealed until the movie is halfway over.

Now that Andy is about to become a grandfather, he reconnected with Grace, who is open to being friendly with Andy, but she’s still a little bit wary of him because she has abandonment issues. Grace dislikes how Andy doesn’t seem to approve of Pete because Andy thinks Pete is nerdy. Grace is also uncomfortable with how Andy sometimes asks her to babysit Billie and Mose on short notice.

Andy is not only stressed-out over the problems in his personal life, but he’s also overwhelmed and struggling with his career. Andy and his business partner Sy (played by Kevin Pollak) are in a lot of debt. In order to reduce costs, they’ve had to decide whether to relocate to a gallery space that has lower rent or decrease the seller asking rate for their artists. Andy adamantly refuses to lower the rates for their artists.

But relocating to a place with lower rent won’t solve Goodrich Gallery’s financial problems. In a meeting with the gallery’s accountant Greg (played by Andrew Leeds), Greg warns Andy and Sy that unless they get a big increase in revenue, the gallery will go out of business in three months. Andy is certain that a talented young artist named Dev (who’s never seen in the movie), whose recent exhibit at the gallery was a flop, could be still be their last big chance of success. Sy isn’t entirely convinced.

And then, Andy finds out that a critically acclaimed, elderly artist named Theresa Thompson has died. Theresa’s artwork is considered hot property, so Andy thinks if Goodrich Gallery can get the rights to exhibit her work, it could be an even bigger financial boost that could help Goodrich Gallery stay in business. Andy has to convince Theresa’s elusive heir/daughter Lola Thompson (played by Carmen Ejogo), who is getting many other offers from bigger galleries. Andy goes to unusual lengths to track down Lola (a 50-year-old single mother) so that he can make his pitch to her in person.

“Goodrich” also has a subplot about Andy becoming friendly with a single father named Terry Koch (played by Michael Urie), whose son Alexander, nicknamed Alex (played by Carlos Solórzano), is a schoolmate friend of Billie and Mose. Terry is gay and divorced from Alex’s other father, who abandoned the family. Andy and Terry meet by chance when Billie, Mose and Alex are late to school on the same day. Because Alex has epilepsy, Alex is excused for his tardiness, while Billie and Mose are not excused.

Andy and Terry strike up a conversation outside the school building after the kids have gone to their classrooms. Terry is a somewhat neurotic motormouth who immediately tells Andy about how he came a single father. Terry also mentions that he’s an actor who has a day job in graphic design. It’s during this conversation that Andy opens up about Naomi and how Andy is also having difficulty adjusting to raising his kids on his own until Naomi figures out what she wants to do after she gets out of rehab.

“Goodrich” sort of ambles along to show how Andy divides his time between his work and his personal life. He prides himself on being macho and being someone who does not cry easily. Andy is worried about losing his business, but he has a certain amount of pride in not letting this worry show. He’s also convinced he can come up with an idea to save the business.

Andy has a restless energy that doesn’t always gel with the patience required to suddenly take care of two 9-year-old kids and still find time to focus on work and pay attention to Grace. He sometimes forgets appointments and doesn’t know how to do things, such as make lunch for Billie and Mose to bring to school. Andy doesn’t know (until Billie tells him) that the private school where his children are students does not serve lunch unless it’s on special occasions.

During the parts of the movie that tend to ramble, viewers might wonder, “Where is this story going? Do we really need to see Andy in yet another scene where he’s rushing somewhere because he’s running late in picking up his kids or taking his kids somewhere?” To its credit, the tone of “Goodrich” seems to be a “take life as it comes” story, instead of hitting certain formulaic beats that many other movies would have with this subject matter of a man who finds himself suddenly having to raise underage kids on his own.

The strongest and best-acted parts of “Goodrich” have to do with the tensions that can occur when a parent has a distant relationship with offspring from a previous marriage and tries to make up for it with offspring from a current marriage. It can cause resentment and jealousy from the offspring from the previous marriage who didn’t get the parent’s attention that the offspring from the current marriage is getting. Grace sees up close that Andy is a very different father to Billie and Mose than the father he was when Grace was an underage child.

Near the end of the movie, there’s a well-written, emotionally explosive scene between Grace and Andy where she unleashes just how she feels about missing out on the time and attention that Andy now has for Billie and Mose. It’s in this scene that Andy truly begins to understand the damage caused by being absent for most of Grace’s childhood. It’s Kunis’ best scene in the movie, which doesn’t show her as often as the marketing materials for “Goodrich” would suggest.

Keaton does a very good job of portraying the complicated and ambitious Andy, who slowly begins to learn how to have a work/life balance. Andy says he loves Naomi and wants to keep their family intact. However, the movie shows that Andy has unresolved issues that he has not confronted yet, such as his tendency to be in denial about serious problems that affect him and his family. For example, Grace wasn’t shocked that Naomi had to go to rehab, but Andy was shocked.

“Goodrich” doesn’t show Andy in any counseling for people who have loved ones with addictions, but he does seek solace in another way by communing with a group where Grace gets emotional healing. The movie ignores or doesn’t address if Naomi is in a 12-step recovery program, which requires addicts to contact and make amends with loved ones for any problems caused by the addict’s addiction. Andy is made to look like an emotionally absent spouse/parent, but Naomi was surely not a perfect spouse/parent either. “Goodrich” doesn’t go into details about how Naomi’s addictions affected her parenting.

“Goodrich” has solid direction but it seems to take for granted that Andy and Naomi come from a socioeconomic class where Naomi can afford to go to an upscale rehab recovery center. Sure, Andy’s business has financial debt, but it’s not so bad that he has to declare bankruptcy and/or lose the family home. “Goodrich” tends to have a superficial/”barely there” examination of how addiction can affect a family. But “Goodrich” delivers competently on what the movie is about: an upper-middle-class, elderly man coming to terms with the type of parent he wants to be to his adult child and his two underage children.

Ketchup Entertainment released “Goodrich” in U.S. cinemas on October 18, 2024.

Review: ‘Four Good Days,’ starring Glenn Close and Mila Kunis

May 5, 2021

by Carla Hay

“Four Good Days”

Directed by Rodrigo García

Culture Representation: Taking place from September 2019 to January 2020 in Riverside, California, the dramatic film “Four Good Days” features a predominantly white cast of characters (with some African Americans and Latinos) representing the middle-class and working-class.

Culture Clash: A heroin addict and her long-estranged mother try to repair their rocky relationship when the mother allows her 31-year-old daughter to move back home with her in the daughter’s attempt to get clean and sober.

Culture Audience: “Four Good Days” will appeal primarly to people interested in watching dramas about mother-daughter relationships or the struggles of drug addicts, but the movie’s overwrought and sometimes unrealistic scenes will be a turnoff to some viewers.

Nicholas Oteri, Audrey Lynn, Joshua Leonard and Mila Kunis in “Four Good Days” (Photo courtesy of Vertical Entertainment)

The dramatic film “Four Good Days” was inspired by a true story, but the shrill melodramatics in too many badly written scenes just make the movie look like overly staged phoniness. Even though lead actresses Glenn Glose and Mia Kunis seem to be putting their best efforts forward as a mother and a daughter with a troubled relationship, “Four Good Days” is ruined by a plethora of eye-rolling, ridiculous moments, especially in the last 15 minutes of the film. Instead of “Four Good Days,” the movie is better-described as “100 Irritating Minutes.”

The beginning of “Four Good Days” (directed by Rodrigo García) sets the tone for the rest of this disappointing movie, which was written by García and Eli Saslow. The movie’s screenplay is based on Saslow’s 2016 Washington Post article “Four Good Days,” about the real-life relationship between recovering drug addict Amanda Wendler and her mother Libby Alexander. In the “Four Good Days” movie, the bickering mother and daughter are Deb (played by Close) and her daughter Margaret “Molly” Wheeler (played by Kunis).

During the opening credits, Molly is seen as a vibrant, healthy-looking person frolicking on a beach. And then, the movie, shows what Molly looks like in September 2019, when this story begins. She’s very thin and strung-out on heroin, with sores all over her face and no upper teeth. She’s disheveled and looks like the homeless person that she is.

Molly hasn’t talked to her mother Deb in years (the movie doesn’t say for how many years), but Molly has shown up unannounced at the front door of Deb’s home in suburban Riverside, California, to beg Deb for a place to stay. Deb says no and firmly tells Molly: “The deal was you wouldn’t come back until you were clean.”

Deb also tells Molly that Deb and Deb’s husband Chris (played by Stephen Root) changed the locks on their home because Molly and her junkie boyfriend Eric stole guitars and other items. Molly says that she and Eric are no longer together, but Deb remains unmoved. She shuts the door on Molly and tells her to come back when she’s clean.

After this “tough love” rejection of her daughter, Deb goes inside the house and is comforted by Chris, who tells Deb that she did the right thing and that she can’t back down from her resolve. Chris comments to Deb about Molly: “She can’t walk if you carry her.” (This movie is filled with trite platitudes that sound like slogans from a drug rehab poster.)

Molly doesn’t go away. Instead, she spends the night sleeping on Deb’s porch. And the next morning, after Molly promises that she’s ready to get clean, Deb relents and tells Molly to get in Deb’s car because Deb is driving her to rehab immediately. Molly tries to make an excuse to go in the house, by saying she hasn’t taken a shower in weeks. However, Deb refuses to let her in the house, and they drive to a detox center called Clear Horizons Recovery. The movie reveals that it’s Molly’s 15th trip to rehab in the 14 years since she became a drug addict at age 17.

During the check-in process, Molly says her main drug of choice is heroin, but she’s also recently done other drugs, such as methadone, crack cocaine, Vicodin and Adderall. Molly’s Medicaid insurance will only cover a three-day stay at Clear Horizons. After that, Molly expects to stay with Deb, but Deb still won’t fully commit to it yet. After Molly is checked into to detox center and as Deb walks away, Molly yells at Deb and calls her a derogatory name that rhymes with “witch.”

Back at home, Deb is struggling with mixed feelings. On the one hand, Deb is relieved that Molly is getting the help that she needs. On the other hand, Deb has been down this road with Molly too many other times before, and it’s always led to Molly relapsing back into drug use. Will this latest rehab stint work this time?

Deb tells Chris in a private conversation in their home how she feels about Molly: “Sometimes I get the feeling that I don’t want to love her anymore … This is the mess you married into.” Chris replies, “You always talk like that when she’s around. Stop doing it.”

Who is this dysfunctional family and how did they end up this way? Through conversations in the movie, it’s gradually revealed in layers what happened. Chris (who is retired) is the second husband of Deb, who works as a facialist in a hotel spa. When Molly was about 15 years old and a freshman in high school, Deb left her first husband Dale and their two children (Molly and Molly’s older sister Ashley) because Deb felt trapped and unhappy in an emotionally abusive marriage.

Deb lived apart from her children for about two years and let Dale take full custody. This estrangement caused a lot of bad blood between the family members. And even though Deb is shown making sincere apologies to a now drug-addicted Molly for abandoning the family, Molly still has a lot of deep-seated resentment against her mother. Meanwhile, Dale (played by Sam Hennings) has essentially cut himself off from Molly because of her constant relapses after promising to get clean.

How did Molly become a drug addict? When Molly was 17 years old, she sprained her knee while water skiing. A doctor prescribed her OxyContin. And as Deb describes it when ranting to Molly’s current rehab doctor, “no refill was denied” in this OxyContin prescription. Molly got hooked on OxyContin and then later turned to heroin. Molly also dropped out of high school because of her drug addiction.

At some point during her on-again, off-again drug use, Molly got married and had two children. But not surprisingly, the marriage didn’t last, and Molly lost custody of the children. Molly’s ex-husband Sean (played by Joshua Leonard) works in construction. Molly and Sean’s children are a son named Colton (played by Nicholas Oteri), who’s about 10 or 11 years old when this story takes place, and Chloe (played by Audrey Lynn), who is about 8 or 9 years old. Molly doesn’t see them on a regular basis, but Deb seems to keep in frequent contact with Molly’s kids, since they all live nearby.

Before Molly checks out of Clear Horizons, she and Deb have an assessment appointment with Clear Horizons physician Dr. Oritz (played by Carlos Lacamara), who has to listen to Deb berate him and blame medical professionals for prescribing OxyContin to people who end up getting addicted. Deb yells at the doctor by saying “you people” are responsible for Molly’s drug addiction. This isn’t the last that viewers will see Deb’s awful shrewishness.

Dr. Ortiz is calm and patient with Deb’s outburst (Molly is mortified) and explains that a post-rehab option for Molly is for her to take an opiate antagonist, which is a medication that supresses cravings for opiates. The doctor explains that this medication, which makes people “immune from getting high,” is an injection administered by a medical professional once a month. Dr. Ortiz also makes it clear that the medication only works on people who have no opioids and other dangerous drugs in their system. Otherwise, it could lead to serious health damage and possible death.

Molly and Deb want to get this opiate antagonist treatment right away. However, Dr. Ortiz explains that the earliest that Molly can get the treatment is in four days. Molly can no longer stay in the detox center because Molly’s insurance won’t cover it and her rehab bed has to go to someone else. And so, Deb lets Molly come home with her.

Most of the movie chronicles the four-day wait for Molly to get her first opiate antagonist treatment. And, unlike what the movie title suggests, it’s a miserable four days. Not surprisingly, Molly and Deb argue a lot, because Deb understandably has a hard time trusting Molly. Deb won’t leave any money or her car keys in places where Molly could steal them. Deb gives Molly a “burner” cell phone that she says Molly can only use to call family members or a medical professional.

Meanwhile, Molly goes through the expected heroin withdrawals, but the movie unrealistically spends just a few scenes showing Molly in agony in one day. She’s shown curled up in a fetal position, complaining about how cold she is. And there are the expected scenes of Molly vomiting. But after Molly’s first full day back in Deb’s home, Molly’s withdrawals aren’t really mentioned again, as if they were just some pesky aches and pains. It’s a very simplistic and inauthentic portrayal of heroin withdrawals.

The movie takes a more realistic approach in how Molly’s physical appearance has been ravaged by drug use. There’s a scene where Molly and Deb visit with a dentist named Dr. Stevens (played by Kim Delgado), who gives Molly a set of upper-teeth dentures to wear. Molly complains that the false teeth hurt because her inflamed gums are so sore. And speaking of sores, the makeup team of “Four Good Days” did a good job of making Molly’s face look like what can really happen to a hardcore drug addict.

Deb’s approach to having Molly live in the home is like a strict parent dealing with a child who is grounded. Molly has a suspended driver’s license because of past DUI arrests. But Deb says that even if Molly had a valid driver’s license, she wouldn’t trust Molly to drive any vehicle because of the possiblity that Molly would be tempted to drive somewhere to get drugs.

After a while, Molly becomes restless and frustrated with feeling like a prisoner in Deb’s home, so there’s more arguing between Deb and Molly. And where is Deb’s retired husband Chris during all this family drama? This movie is so sloppily written that there are long stretches where Chris is nowhere to be seen and he’s not even mentioned.

The house isn’t that big, but even if it were, Chris’ presence is almost like an afterthought in the movie. He vaguely seems to support Deb’s decision to let Molly stay in the house, as long as Molly stays clean, but he’s not in the movie enough to make a real impact. However, Root and Close have one pretty good scene together where Deb is ranting and yelling at Chris to say something and she calls him a “fucking wimp.” Chris explodes and gives bullying Deb the verbal smackdown that she deserves, by yelling back at her, “I’m not your punching bag!”

“Four Good Days” should be commended for not sugarcoating the reality that families who deal with drug addiction often have at least one enabler/co-dependent who hurts more than helps the addict. Deb has all the characteristics of being a toxic enabler/co-dependent. Deb thinks she means well, but she often makes things worse. A perfect example of her toxic enabling/co-dependency is a very irresponsible decison that Deb makes in the last 15 minutes of the film. It’s a decision that will make viewers really dislike this movie.

“Four Good Days” goes a little too overboard in showing Deb vaccillating between wanting to distrust Molly and wanting to coddle Molly. In one of the worst scenes in “Four Good Days,” Deb goes to a diner to have breakfast with her older daughter Ashley (played by Carla Gallo), who is estranged from Molly. Molly was supposed to be at this breakfast meeting too, but she backed out at the last minute. Ashley doesn’t seem too surprised.

Deb and Ashley start off having a good mother-daughter talk. Deb tells Ashley how Molly is doing. Ashley, who is an attorney and a single mother, gives Deb updates on what’s been going on in her life, including Ashley’s new relationship with a boyfriend. There’s a little bit of tension when Ashley comments that Deb is obsessed with Molly and Molly’s problems. Deb essentially admits it’s true.

Things take a turn in the conversation when Deb notices that she left her wallet at home. Deb wants to go back and get the wallet because she doesn’t want Molly to be alone in the house with any cash that’s easy to find. Ashley insists that she will pay for their meal and she orders Deb not to go back to the house. It’s Ashley’s way of telling her mother not to let Molly’s addiction take over Deb’s life.

Ashley continues to talk happily about her new boyfriend, but Deb has an expression on her face that she’s tuned out of what Ashley is saying. Ashley can tell that her mother is thinking about Molly possibly finding Deb’s wallet at home. And then, Deb suddenly gets up and leaves Ashley at the table without even saying goodbye. Horrible. Ashley is not seen or mentioned in the movie again.

Molly gets restless from being cooped up in the house, so Deb invites Molly to go grocery shopping with her. At the grocery store, they run into a former high school classmate of Molly’s named Coach Miller (played by Rebecca Field), who now teaches a health and fitness class at a local high school. Molly’s drug problems are apparently very well-known in the community, because Coach Miller tells Molly that people are rooting for her in her recovery.

Coach Miller says that Molly could be an inspiration/deterrent to the kids in Coach Miller’s class. She invites Molly to be a guest speaker in the class, to talk about the dangers of drug addiction. Molly politely declines because she says she’s not good at public speaking. The problem with this invitation is that Coach Miller doesn’t know if Molly (who is fresh out of rehab) is really the best person to lecture anyone about what it takes to have long-term sobriety.

But then later in the movie, Molly is later shown giving a tear-filled speech in front of Coach Miller’s students, while Deb is standing near the back of the class. Molly is both self-righteous and apologetic in her speech. Molly berates a smug student (played by Gabriela Flores), who says that she would never become a drug addict. And to throw in some more melodrama, Molly pulls out the dentures in her mouth so that the students can see Molly’s diseased, toothless gums. And then, Molly wails and sobs toward the end of the speech, as she tells Deb how sorry she is about the pain she caused.

During the car drive from the school, Deb tells Molly how proud she is of her. And then, Molly uses that moment to tell her mother that she wants to help other drug addicts in their recoveries. And by the way, Molly says, she wants to check in on a 15-year-old girl druggie friend named Sammy, because Molly is worrried about Sammy. And so, Molly begs her mother to drive to a drug-infested area to help Molly look for Sammy.

At first, Deb is dead-set against the idea. But she’s worn down by Molly’s pleading and drives to the area and tells Molly that she has five minutes to ask around for Sammy. This eventually leads to another ridiculous scene where Deb and Molly end up in a drug house, where Deb aggressively confronts a large man on drugs who could have a weapon on him. But Deb doesn’t think about these things when she loses her temper, which she does a lot in this movie.

“Four Good Days” isn’t all about Deb and Molly’s hostile conflicts with each other. They have some occasions where they try to repair their damaged relationship. In one scene, mother and daughter have a tender moment together when Deb gives Molly a much-needed facial treatment. And in another scene, Molly’s ex-husband Sean brings Colton and Chloe over to the house to visit. It’s a glimpse of how this fractured family could be if they can heal in the right ways.

But those moments of tranquil harmony are overshadowed by angry turmoil. After a while, it’s very obvious that Molly isn’t the only addict in the family. Her mother Deb is addicted to chaos. And she’s in deep denial over it, which makes her even more insufferable to watch.

Close’s immense talent as an actress is hampered by how the character of Deb veers into asburdity and self-delusion. Deb is intended to be a complicated, flawed person, but some of the decisions that Deb makes and how she handles situations actually make Deb more into a bad stereotype of a domineering, ill-tempered matriarch. “Four Good Days” director García and Close previously worked together on the drama “Albert Nobbs,” which earned Close an Oscar nominaton for playing the movie’s cross-dressing title character. “Four Good Days” is far from an Oscar-caliber film.

Kunis’ depiction of a flaky drug addict has moments of realism, especially in the first half of the movie, but there are other times when Kunis is over-acting. It’s almost as if she’s thinking that her portrayal of drug addiction in this movie will possibly get her nominated for major awards. It won’t. The rest of the movie’s cast members are serviceable in their very sparsely written roles.

One of the best scenes in the film isn’t with Deb and Molly. It’s a scene when Deb angrily confronts her ex-husband Dale (played by Sam Hemmings) and tries to shame him for not being in contact with Molly in the days since Deb told Dale that Molly was spendng time recovering in Deb’s home. In this scene, the pent-up resentment that these two ex-spouses have had for each other over the years comes out like a bomb exploding. Deb and Dale each blame each other in some way for Molly’s addiction, when in reality Molly is the only one who can and should take responsibility for her life.

One of the worst things about “Four Good Days” is that it starts off fooling viewers into thinking that it will be a realistic story of how drug addiction can damage relationships. And although some scenes crackle with intensity, the movie takes a very Hollywood approach to how these real-life issues are handled. The character of Deb gets angry with screwed-up daughter Molly for dragging Deb down with Molly’s problems. However, Molly and Deb are such grating, self-pitying characters that this whole movie is dragged down by their annoying antics.

Vertical Entertainment released “Four Good Days” in select U.S. cinemas on April 30, 2021.

Review: ‘Breaking News in Yuba County,’ starring Allison Janney, Mila Kunis, Awkwafina, Wanda Sykes, Juliette Lewis, Samira Wiley and Regina Hall

February 21, 2021

by Carla Hay

“Breaking News in Yuba County”

Directed by Tate Taylor

Culture Representation: Taking place in the fictional U.S. Southern city of Stanlow, the dark comedy “Breaking News in Yuba County” features a predominantly white cast (with some African Americans, Asians and Latinos) representing the middle-class, working-class and criminal underground.

Culture Clash: A lonely, middle-aged woman pretends that her philandering criminal husband has been kidnapped (even though he really died of a heart attack), so that she can get sympathy and attention.

Culture Audience: “Breaking News in Yuba County” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of star Allison Janney and to people who don’t mind watching incoherent movies about people behaving badly.

Allison Janney, Mila Kunis and Regina Hall in “Breaking News in Yuba County” (Photo Anna Kooris/MGM)

Oscar-winning actress Allison Janney has worked with director Tate Taylor in all of his feature films so far, and she usually plays supporting or minor characters in these movies. The dark and violent comedy “Breaking News in Yuba County” is the first Taylor-directed film where Janney is front and center as the movie’s lead character. And it’s a dreadful misstep not only for Taylor and Janney but also for everyone involved in this embarrassing mess. “Breaking News in Yuba County” (whose producers include Taylor and Jake Gyllenhaal) is proof that having a talented cast doesn’t automatically equal a good movie.

In “Breaking News in Yuba County” (whose horrendous screenplay was written by Amanda Idoko), Janney portrays Sue Buttons, a lonely woman who feels neglected and under-appreciated and goes to extreme lengths to get attention. The movie shows obvious signs that Sue doesn’t get the respect that she thinks she deserves, to try and make her look sympathetic. But her personality and actions are so off-putting (and so are almost all of the characters in this stinker film) that the movie’s attempts to be comedic are pathetic and monotonous.

“Breaking News in Yuba County” takes place in an unnamed U.S. state in the South, in a fictional city called Stanlow, located in Yuba County. In the movie’s opening scene, viewers see Sue listening to motivational affirmations on her iPod as she goes to a supermarket. She repeats these mantras several times throughout the movie: “My story matters. I am enough. I am confident.” Sue’s self-directed pep talks do little to change the way that the outside world treats her. And something happens on her birthday that causes her to snap and go from being a mild-mannered, law-abiding citizen to being a stone-cold, heartless fraudster.

She arrives at the grocery store to pick up her small birthday cake, which is inscribed with the words “Happy Birthday, Sue.” But Sue notices that the “e” looks more like a “c.” She points out this mistake to the pastry worker behind the counter, with a tone of voice implying that she wants the error corrected. But the worker just ignores Sue’s attempt to assert herself and asks if Sue is paying by cash or credit.

Sue is married to a corrupt banker named Karl (played by Matthew Modine), who’s first seen at their home talking dirty to a woman whom he plans to meet later for a sexual tryst. Sue doesn’t know about this affair but she’ll soon find out on her birthday. She’ll also find out later about her husband’s illegal activities. In the meantime, Sue has made plans for her and Karl to have a romantic dinner at a restaurant on her birthday.

But as soon as she arrives home, Karl is out the door to go meet up with his mistress. Meanwhile, Sue takes her birthday cake and makes the correction on the letter “e” herself. She then goes to her job, a place called Sidewinder Safety Tubs, where she works in customer service at a call center. The only work on the job that the movie shows her doing is taking one phone call from a rude customer who curses at her.

Considering all the ludicrous shenanigans that Sue gets up to later that take up all of her time, the movie shouldn’t have bothered showing her having a job at all. This movie is so badly written that it’s never explained how Sue took all the time off from work that she takes to try to cover up her web of lies. But the filmmakers seem to assume that everyone who’s watching this movie is as idiotic as the characters.

Sue just happens to be driving near a motel when she sees Karl’s car parked outside. She gets out and sees him holding some flowers and going into a motel room while calling a woman inside “honey” before he shuts the door. An alarmed Sue goes to the motel’s front desk and correctly assumes that the room is reserved in Karl’s name. Sue tells the front desk clerk that she’s his wife and pretends to have accidentally locked herself out of that room, so she asks for a spare key.

Sure enough, when Sue lets herself into the motel room, Karl is having sex with another woman, whose name is Leah Norton (played by Bridget Everett), whom Sue has never met before. Sue gets angry, while Karl and Leah are naturally startled and horrified at being caught. Karl is so surprised that he falls off the bed, has a heart attack, and dies.

While Leah is freaking out and babbling, Sue finds out that Leah is also married. She slaps Leah and tells her that she will inform Leah’s husband about Leah’s cheating if Leah doesn’t leave the motel immediately. Sue also tells Leah that Sue will take care of the problem of Karl’s dead body. Leah doesn’t hesitate to quickly leave the motel.

Instead of being upset that Karl is dead, Sue forlornly says out loud as she sits on the bed, “You forgot my birthday.” Sue then hatches a plan to bury the body in a lot near the motel. This movie is so stupid, that it shows Sue digging the grave in plain view where anyone could have easily seen her. But there would be no “Breaking News in Yuba County” if she were caught that quickly and easily.

Meanwhile, Sue doesn’t find out until after Karl dies that he was involved in a money-laundering scheme with some local criminals, who used Karl to launder millions of dollars. The people in this illegal enterprise are a ruthless crime boss named Mr. Kim (played by Keong Sim); his sometimes-bungling daughter Mina (played by Awkafina), who tries to be as tough as her father; a menacing, trigger-happy thug named Ray (played by Clifton Collins Jr.); and Karl’s younger brother Petey (played by Jimmi Simpson), who’s been trying to leave his criminal life behind.

Petey works as a salesperson at a furniture store named Rita’s, owned by a sassy lesbian named Rita (played by Wanda Sykes), who manages the store with her equally feisty live-in girlfriend Debbie (played by Ellen Barkin). Rita and Debbie know that Petey has a criminal background, but he’s told them that he’s trying to “go straight” and stay out of trouble. Debbie is often suspicious of Petey and sometimes accuses him of stealing from the store. Meanwhile, Rita has a friendly rapport with Petey, and she strangely tells Petey that she wouldn’t mind too much if he was caught stealing because she would understand that he would be stealing out of desperation.

Sue is fixated on a local news/public affairs TV program called “The Gloria Michaels Show,” which has been doing constant coverage of a missing 13-year-old girl named Emma Rose. After Sue has buried Karl’s body, she goes home and watches the show. She has a silent “a-ha” moment when she sees Emma Rose’s parents Jonathan and Robin (played by Michael A. Newcomer and Liz Elkins Newcomer) being interviewed by host Gloria Michaels (played by Juliette Lewis), who tells the distraught parents that they have the unwavering support of the community in finding Emma Rose. Gloria is a TV personality who’s a mix of Nancy Grace and Deborah Norville, even down to having the same type of blonde bob hairstyle and Southern accent.

Sue decides that she can get the public’s sympathy and attention if she pretends that Karl is missing. Sue calls the restaurant to cancel the dinner reservation by saying that her husband isn’t feeling well. It’s a discrepancy (and plot hole) that a good investigation team would be able to uncover when Sue later reports that Karl is missing. She foolishly claimed that Karl disappeared during the time she said that he was too “sick” to go to the restaurant. Another big plot hole is that Sue never bothers to contact anyone to try to look for Karl. But, of course, this movie has incompetent cops who investigate and overlook many of these things that would expose her lies.

Sue goes to the local police station to report Karl’s disappearance, but the officer on duty, Detective Cam Harris (played by Regina Hall), is impatient and dismissive, especially when Sue tells her that Karl has been missing for less than 48 hours. Detective Harris doesn’t file a report and instead advises Sue to ask Karl’s friends and relatives if they know where he is, because many missing spouses usually have just gone somewhere without telling their spouses. Once again, Sue feels ignored and disrespected.

The gravity of what Sue has done begins to sink in with her. When she goes home, she has a meltdown and starts trashing her house. She picks up the birthday cake, as if she’s going to destroy it too, but she can’t bring herself to do it. It’s symbolic of how she’ll take extreme measures later in the story to save herself and destroy others, just so she won’t be exposed for committing the crimes of illegal disposal of a corpse and lying to the police.

Sue has a younger half-sister named Nancy (played by Mila Kunis), who comes over to visit shortly after Sue has her meltdown. The house looks like it’s been ransacked, so Sue pretends to be distraught that Karl is missing. Sue also plays along with Nancy’s assumption that Karl was probably kidnapped during a home invasion.

It just so happens that Nancy is a highly ambitious and competitive TV reporter who works for a local station that’s a rival to the station that has “The Gloria Michaels Show.” Sue and Nancy see Karl’s “disappearance” as an opportunity to get media attention for themselves. Predictably, Nancy offers to interview Sue on TV about the “disappearance.” Nancy doesn’t really care that Karl could be missing; she just wants to get a “news scoop” over the competition.

This TV interview is the first time that Petey finds out that his older brother Karl is missing. And that’s a problem because Karl had $3 million that he was supposed to launder, so now that money is missing too. In a panic, Petey tells Mina and Ray that he doesn’t know where Karl or the money is. And inexplicably, Mina decides to tell Petey that she and Ray have kidnapped Karl, so that they can extort $20,000 in ransom money from Petey. It’s a dumb decision by any standard, but it’s an example of how bad this movie is.

What follows is a convoluted and messy farce, with betrayals, more lies, and people inevitably getting killed in brutal ways. Detective Harris is the only cop on the case who gets suspicious of Sue. But Detective Harris is stonewalled by her dimwitted junior cop partner Officer Jones (played by T.C. Matherne) and their boss Captain Riggins (played by Dominic Burgess), who both think that Sue doesn’t seem like the type who could be a criminal mastermind. It’s a subtle commentary on how certain people, because of their physical appearance, are given a “privileged pass” with law enforcement.

The movie has a few supporting characters that don’t have much to do except be possible targets of violence. Petey has a pregnant girlfriend named Jonelle (played by Samira Wiley), who grows concerned at how strange he’s been acting lately. Her pregnancy only seems to be in the movie so there’s an inevitable scene of a pregnant woman in a vicious fight. And then there’s one of Karl’s bank colleagues named Steve (played by Chris Lowell), who doesn’t do much but act frightened when Mina and Ray predictably show up at the bank to look for Karl.

This type of low-quality movie usually has a cast of unknown actors. But it’s very disappointing to see how many talented and famous actors (who are all known for doing much better work elsewhere) are in this atrocious movie. Not even the action stunts are interesting to watch.

And the tone of the film is horribly uneven, as the actors do their performances as if they’re in very different films. Awkwafina, Barkin, Sykes, Kunis, Hall and Simpson act as if they’re in a goofy slapstick comedy. Matherene, Burgess, Wiley and Lowell act as if they’re in a serious drama. Janney, Lewis, Collins, Sim and Everett come closest to capturing the movie’s intended dark satire. Modine isn’t in the movie long enough for most viewers to care about his Karl character, who seems to be despicable anyway.

Almost as annoying as this movie’s characters is the music score by Jeff Beal, because it’s the epitome of sitcom smarm. Given how violent this movie is, the music is completely out-of-place and awkward, because it sounds like something that should be for an outdated family comedy series on TV. The overall direction of the movie is lazy, as if Taylor just let the actors do their own thing instead of having a cohesive tone for the film. And clearly, the filmmakers didn’t do enough to fix the many problems in the screenplay.

It seems as if “Breaking News in Yuba County” tried and failed to be like a Guy Ritchie crime film, by having a story where lawbreakers comically try to outdo each other in absurd ways, while they attempt to cover up everything and blame their misdeeds on other people. There are plenty of female-centric dark comedy satires that get all the elements right, including 2017’s “I, Tonya,” the movie that garnered Janney her Academy Award. Sometimes bad movies are fun to watch, but “Breaking News in Yuba County” is the type of irritating movie where viewers can’t wait for it to be over and won’t care what happens to the characters in the end.

MGM’s American International Pictures released “Breaking News in Yuba County” in select U.S. cinemas and on digital and VOD on February 12, 2021.