Silver Linings Playbook
At a glance...
- Directed by David O. Russell
- Released in 2012
- Runtime 122 minutes
- Watched at home
- Final feelings: Deeply annoying.
OK I do think they are playing with interesting ideas in the first half of this. Bradley Cooper certainly acts familiar enough to me as a fellow bipolar disorder haver (of a different category), and his family doubly so. I think there was an opportunity for the relationship between mental health, policing, and carcerality to be explored because unless you interact with those systems, you really don't know and understand how impactful and intrusive they can be.
Once we introduce Tiffany to the mix, though, the direction of the film gradually takes more obvious and less interesting route, and I think that's a shame. At some point Pat figures out Tiffany faked the letter, and we don't get any acknowledgement until the end. Maybe it's just me but if I was going crazy about an ex (which has happened before in my life though not for a while), I would read that as a sign that Tiffany was part of the broader plot to keep me separated and it would make me question every interaction I've had with her. And that interpretation would be totally justified too, since turns out Tiffany was plotting with Pat's parents the whole time! But whatever, stupid shit like, "I knew I was in love with you when I first saw you" is good enough to douse any actual consequence of having a bipolar main character.
Like, I added this movie to my list because of a reddit post that was like, "Silver Lining's Playbook is the bipolar disorder movie rep", and I guess that person only paid attention in the first half, just like DeSean Jackson stopped paying attention at the 1 yard line that one time in 2008. Now that I've segued into football, I just want to make a quick sidenote that it's cute that this movie so conveniently writes the therapist into the house during the big betting scene so that he can ask what a parlay is on behalf of the audience, because it used to be that if you wanted to do shit bets like that you had to have a bookie in your rolodex to write your gambling fan-mail to. Now I can't take a shit in the morning without getting a draftkings sponsored lunchable ad on my e-sports highlight reel youtube video to help me wake up for work in the morning, I can't watch a single televised sporting event on the planet without a little betting line dangling in the corner like, "yeah you're a fucking sucker, you idiot, bet on this game in a 25 way clusterfuck, you little bitch", and every single clip of the most mundane shit in baseball has 100 comments of absolute bozos saying, "you didn't average 3 pitches per AB and didn't wear the red socks that day and FUCKED my parlay, bitch!"
What I'm saying is that I hate gambling and I hate that it's in sports and I'm not saying it's this movie's fault that it got to this point but what I am saying is that gambling is a fucked up way to interact with your children. I don't think it's cute or fun or funny, and I hated that Pat's first heart-to-heart with his dad was actually about superstition about betting on the game, and I'm supposed to just be like, "ha, what a joker that dad fellow". Gambling does not save lives, and I am happy to be completely humorless about that fact in this film, because I am personally aggrieved by the current state of gambling integrating with the things I love.
Honestly this is just such a weird film to me. I guess it makes sense why people adored it. Going in blind for the first time ever, though, this just feels like a waste of a perfectly good mental illness. Also every single one of the marriages on screen in this film should get divorced. Oh man, yeah that's another annoying thing, which is that Pat just says something to his friend Ronnie and suddenly their marriage is fixed at the grand finale of the film. That's why people like Pat are fucking annoying, because that shit never happens and it never works, but you can put it in a movie and people will reference it in therapy sessions to say why positive thinking matters.
Maybe my whole screed here can be summed thusly: this is a movie where the most annoying children you know also intimately know the DSM-5. I can see where it's a good rom-com but this is not for me.
(God, Maybe I am a rom-com hater...but I'm not a reactionary hater! My problem with rom-coms is not that there are women in the movies. My problem with rom-coms is I think the relationships in them are bad. I'm a relationship hater, not a rom-com hater at all!)