CHICAGO – Patrick McDonald of HollywoodChicago.com audio review for the doc series “Charlie Hustle & the Matter of Pete Rose,” about the rise and bitter fall of the major league legend, the MLB’s all-time hits leader, only to be banned from the sport because of gambling. Streaming on MAX and on HBO since July 24th.!—break—>
Film Review: Joe Swanberg’s ‘Marriage Material’ Deftly Observes Young Adulthood
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CHICAGO – Ever since stumbling upon his 2005 directorial debut, “Kissing on the Mouth,” I’ve been deeply transfixed by the cinema of Chicago filmmaker Joe Swanberg. There’s a startling honesty to his work that is unmatched by many of his peers, as well as a near-obsessive desire to capture the “truth” in his fictional characters. He never shies away from sexual frankness or raw intimacy if they are required to serve the story.
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Though Swanberg earned some of the best reviews of his career for his 2009 effort, “Alexander the Last,” the director later admitted that he felt uncomfortably pressured by the level of expectations surrounding the project. The experience made him realize that he was more interested in making micro-budget films with close friends and collaborators. 2011 marked a creative renaissance for Swanberg, who premiered a series of painstakingly personal films that directly confronted questions raised by various viewers, such as how acts of intimacy can be “faked” onscreen.
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The viral release of Swanberg’s 55-minute film, “Marriage Material” is meant to coincide with the first installment of the Joe Swanberg: Collected Films 2011 subscription, which includes four new movies accompanied by a passel of rare extra features (my favorite being a vinyl 45 soundtrack album). “Material” is bound to entice cinephiles into checking out the auteur’s other recent work, but it also succeeds on its own terms as a standalone triumph that illustrates the evolution of Swanberg’s artistic voice. At the beginning of his career, Swanberg’s gaze was more restless, resulting in handheld photography that worked better on a small screen. His first post-”Alexander” effort, “Uncle Kent,” was the perfect transitional film, since it fused handheld segments with more polished “locked-in frames” meant to resemble a graphic novel. I found them more evocative of the long takes utilized by Béla Tarr or Michael Haneke, yet Swanberg doesn’t have the cold detachment of a passive observer. With a perceptive eye similar to that of Rodrigo García, Swanberg focuses on his characters for prolonged periods of time, capturing the nuances of their behavior until we feel as if we are in the same room with them. Such an approach requires absolute believability on the part of the actors, and that is exactly what Caroline White and Kentucker Audley supply in “Material.”
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![Caroline White and Kentucker Audley star in Joe Swanberg’s Marriage Material. Caroline White and Kentucker Audley star in Joe Swanberg’s Marriage Material.](http://www.hollywoodchicago.com/sites/default/files/MarriageMaterial.jpg)
Caroline White and Kentucker Audley star in Joe Swanberg’s Marriage Material.
Photo credit: Swanberry, LLC