Jackie (2012)

I enjoyed this film, whether because of or in spite of some of its peculiarities, I know not. Two young adult dutch sisters, with lives in Holland as problematic as anybody's, get word that their absentee American mother has gone into a hospital in New Mexico, dare each other to take on the job, and wind up still together, meeting her for the first time at a rehab center in the States. The story is of how they all get to know each other and how the sisters are able to make some changes of their own, thanks to the journey. Oddly, many sexes are represented here, but decent non-macho, non-dickhead males are thin on the ground. To be fair, that doesn't seem to be a poke at Americans, since the sisters have the same issues to deal with back in Amsterdam-and are forced to deal with them via Skype during the road trip; just odd. Another oddness is that the filmmakers set and shot the story in a New Mexico that could have been the location for "the Road". It's a flat, barren wasteland that looks more like the deserts of West Texas or Oklahoma than like anybody's Land of Enchantment. Their trip takes them through one cruddy jerkwater roadhouse after another. That serves to point out that, yes, some Europeans do like American Country-Western music. But what happened to the Rocky Mountains, Santa Fe and Albequerque? New Mexico can be spectacular, but the director seems to have chosen what she found under a rock instead. Odd. If for no other reason, this film is worth watching for the "Dykes on Bikes" sequence. I will say no more.

(The spoiler within this review is not too bad. I think you can read this review instead of the wikipedia-summary before watching the movie without getting disappointed. Perhaps it even increases your "adventure".)On the surface this move seems to deal with two sisters having a great adventure on the road and leaving their old lives behind. Already within the first minutes you can see typical patterns; both sisters struggle with their individual lives. The older one is egocentric and career focused, the younger one seems to have deep problems in her current relationship. As soon as they viewer gets to know that both of them are going to have a road trip, the spectator can imagine that this will change both lives and characters. This pattern has always been present in movies, from present to past. (Just as in Despicable Me, The Intouchables, Cruel Intentions,… to list a few examples.)In my point of view, the movies subject is on a different level. Beyond the obvious plot, it deals with the family-ideal as it exists and especially with the relations between its members. Whilst the viewer gets comfortable with the situation, the ending questions which connections and what behavior a family member has to fulfill. And I'm pretty sure that the writers even had some thoughts which didn't come to my mind yet. Furthermore, I think that the spectator has to be concerned with this question before watching the movie. Otherwise it's going to be clumsy and sometimes boring.Besides, the music and the landscape pictures are beautiful. (Concerning the booklet and the movie's title… well, too bad they won't reach the expected audience.)

There are excellent performances by the 3 actresses here. Holly Hunter gives a mysterious and intense performance as the fabled and unknown mother, since the daughters grew up in the Netherlands and mom, a surrogate mother, lives in New Mexico. (These are not spoilers since this part of the plot is laid out within the first few minutes of the movie, and reported elsewhere.) There are some nice insights into the lives of twin sisters growing up without a mother, since their parents are 2 men. There is no political or moral statement about this, just a natural occurrence without a woman in their lives. The intriguing thing is how both sisters reacted quite differently. As the plot moves along, these differences are fleshed out. They must also confront their childhood fantasies about "Mother" when they come into contact with the wonderfully strange Hunter character. The cinematography is delicious, given the New Mexico locations.Though this is an unconventional reunion story, Adoptees, Birth Mothers and others who wound up in families by non-conventional means will share in the sense of loss these sisters have experienced as well as the inner journey they both must navigate. However, the plot itself crashes along in a nonsensical way at times, and as things build towards a perceived happy ending, the contrived action overwhelms! In such a short period of time, insights and redemption and connection and breakthroughs and awakenings and, etc ..., they come so fast and furious that the "heart string pulling machine" was on overdrive as the plot becomes gratuitously formulaic.However, during this time when I wanted to walk out of the movie, others were crying and cheering, so you may see it differently.Other plot devices used in this movie will have to go uncritiqued because of spoiler issues.

Road-movies can be fun depending on the depth of the story and the journey there and back might even leave you begging for more. "Jackie", however, is an insipid excursion into boredom city, where the waiting-for-something-to-happen is the only thing actually happening. We've all been on that road before, looking for that something meaningful we think we lost and finding it after a long search may not bring the satisfaction we were expecting. It's not a long movie, but the slow pace and lack of rhythm makes it the perfect sleeping medicine. Unfortunately you realize you're still in the theater, so snoozing through the credits might not look very nice. The story is not so bad, but the fact that it takes so long for everything to wrap up makes this movie quite a pain to watch.