Movie Rec: "Rachel Getting Married"

[retsuko]

"Rachel Getting Married" is notable for a number of reasons, but first and foremost among them is the Battle Over How to Load the Dishwasher scene. It was also the reason that my Mom and I went to see the movie in the first place. My family has had its share of squabbles over how to load the dishwasher (my uncle hems and haws and reloads things here and there muttering, "don't want to waste water, now, save money, yes, now, see, that could go here and save space") and Mom and I were not disappointed. The Dishwasher scene is the main characters' family at their absolute most neurotic and dysfunctional, and it's egged on by well-meaning friends of the family who utterly fail to see what's really going on until it's too late. One character says, "Well, I've drawn some sketches and plans about how to utilize extra space in the dishwasher," and all hell breaks loose. The fact that this family would bicker over how to load the dishwasher so intensely in the first place is a good barometer for the rest of the film--if you're into dysfunctional families and realizing that no matter how annoying/crazy your family is, there are far worse, this movie is for you. If you want to see an Oscar-worthy performance by Anne Hathaway and an arguably Oscar-worthy performance by an ensemble cast, then step right up, too. But this isn't a nonstop laugh movie, and the serious elements of the story quickly take center-stage, even with the moments of genuine hilarity.

"Rachel Getting Married" is the story of a family's weekend, centered around Rachel's wedding, but really centered on her sister Kym's (Anne Hathaway) return from drug rehab. It quickly becomes clear that the stint in rehab has not produced the results that her family wanted to see, and Kym, while not on any drugs, is still an addict, lying and cheating to get what she wants. This drama unfolds at the heart of a hurricane of a wedding, one where everyone is expected to "best friends" and have the best time and the most fun ever! The aura of false comradeship quickly wanes as the source of Kym's addiction and its effect on her and her family reveals itself.

With this sort of drama, I usually find myself despising all the characters at some level; people bickering about their problems makes for hit-or-miss drama with me. Yet, in this movie, I couldn't bring myself to hate anyone, despite their shortcomings. For example, I wanted to dislike Kym's father for generally making her feel uncomfortable and following her around the house every chance he got. How do you truly quit something if people suspect that you have not? But then things unwound for him, and I saw what a precarious position he was in; he could not bring himself to hate Kym, but she had hurt him so terribly and he was a person just making his way through the dark, not sure what was coming next, or what was right.

And I wanted to hate Kym: she lied and whined, and it wasn't just little lies; it was huge, huge things that had kept her from fully undergoing rehab (like saying that she and her sister had been molested in order to have an excuse about why she did drugs.) I wanted to shake her. But then: in her AA meeting, she reveals what she had done while high that broke her family and my heart kind of slowed for her. When she was 16, she had taken her little brother to the park, gotten into a car accident on the way home, and her brother drowned as a result. And watching this character talk about how she couldn't forgive herself and thought that God didn't forgive her, either, I couldn't bring myself to hate her, at all. How do you have a life after doing something like that? How do you apologize for it? Perhaps it's only natural that you grasp at every excuse/straw you can in order to put it behind you. And when it breaks your family so completely, how do you atone? And, as the family, what do you do about the person who's still related to you but you wish would vanish from the face of the planet? There's a sad scene about halfway through the film where Kym comes back from the afore-mentioned AA meeting to find her sister and father in an intense discussion over the seating arrangements at the wedding, and they keep moving the figurine that represents Kym from table to table--no one wants to lay claim to her or have her close by, and she knows exactly what's going on.

It doesn't help that I got the feeling this family was neurotic before anything terrible happened involving drugs and death. In some ways, this was every old-money, East Coast family I've ever met, except with two parents who were rather self-involved and must have been willingly oblivious to the reality of the situation around them. The wedding they throw for their daughter is meant to heal wounds, and it does so--but only in small ways, not enough to patch over the huge rift that's been lurking in the background for years. Still, the small moments where healing does happen represent huge steps for everyone involved, and they're beautifully shot. Kym leaves the reception and lights a paper lantern, sailing it across the lake on their family's property. Rachel and her new husband are slow-dancing in the house after the wedding and they invite Kym to join them. And, in the end, Kym heads back to rehab willingly and with some understanding of what her family's been going through for the time she's been gone. It's not a complete makeover, but it's a meaningful one.

Note: this movie is shot entirely on hand-held camera, and the resulting film-work made my Mom ill and me rather queasy by the end of the whole thing (Mom left early.) I wish now that we had waited for the DVD because I know this wouldn't bother me on the small screen. I do understand the director's aim behind the choice--this movie is all about frenetic energy, sensory overload, and detoxing, and through the hand-held camera, we get just a taste of what Kym is experiencing (a dizzying whirlwind of unearthed secrets, hatreds, joys, and sorrows.)

Comments

[psychoe.livejournal.com]

I love loved this movie. I couldn't hate Kym either because I sympathized with her all the way.

Amazing performance by Anne!

[cerusee.livejournal.com]

I've enjoyed every Anne Hathaway movie I've seen, even though they were movies I wouldn't normally go see (I did not see them *because* they were Hathaway movies, it's just an odd coincidence), and I remember thinking that this looked interesting. I'll keep an eye peeled for it.