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Playing like a feature-film continuation of Family Ties, Lisa Cholodenko's Laurel Canyon pits a free-spirited mother against her uptight, conservative and - yes - perpetually embarrassed 21st century version of Alex P. Keaton. Because the mom, and the film itself, is all about sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll, it's either ironic or just plain kooky that she's played by Frances McDormand, who was dead-set against those virtues as Elaine Miller in Almost Famous.
Canyon is, as one would expect, set in that titular part of the Hollywood Hills - more specifically in the very attractive bungalow owned by a legendary record producer named Jane (McDormand, City By the Sea). It's the destination of Jane's son Sam (Christian Bale, Reign of Fire) and his fiancée Alex (Kate Beckinsale, Serendipity), who have both recently graduated from Harvard Medical School. Sam, a wannabe shrink, has been awarded a prestigious fellowship at an LA hospital, while Alex is looking forward to peace and quiet so she can work on her dissertation about the reproduction of fruit flies.
But there's little solitude at the house when Sam and Alex get there. His mom, who was supposed to be living in her Malibu digs, still hasn't finished up her latest recording project. So Sam has to contend with his loopy mother and the perpetual presence of an up-and-coming Brit band out of which she's desperately trying to coax a big hit single of the week. As if that weren't enough, Jane is banging the band's lead singer, Ian (Alessandro Nivola, Jurassic Park III). The rest of the band, by the way, is played with minimal gusto by Lou Barlow, Russell Pollard and Imaad Wasif - also known as The New Folk Implosion. Cool.
With his fellowship occupying most of his time, Sam pleads with Alex to look for new, temporary housing while she's working on her paper. Alex, however, finds herself being slowly seduced by the trippy and opulent goings-on Chez Jane. You know those people who studied hard in high school so they could get into a good college so they could get into medical school so they could get good jobs but now half of their lives are over and they haven't done anything fun yet? That's Alex. And not to be outdone, Sam isn't quite sure what to do about his attraction to a co-worker (Solaris' Natascha McElhone, who reprises her Truman Show role as The Girl Who Fucks Everything Up).
"Where could all this be going?" you might wonder. Sadly, the answer is "Nowhere." These characters are more defined than we're used to seeing in most films, but that doesn't make them any more enjoyable to watch. Unless that's the point - I didn't like or even come close to sympathizing with any of them. Not one could be considered a protagonist or an antagonist. Writer-director Cholodenko (High Art) definitely made them deeply flawed and incapable of garnering the audience's respect for a reason, but I'm not sure what that reason was. People are dysfunctional - we get it already. And shrinks who are too dumb to realize they're messed up? C'mon.
Even Canyon's ending is somewhat of a copout, offering zilch in terms of denouement. I don't usually mind films without any resolution, and when I don't give a shit about the characters, it doesn't bother me at all - I couldn't have cared less what happened to any of these people. The acting as all relatively even, but on the plus side, Canyon's tech package is memorable, with Wally Pfister's (Insomnia) photography and Craig Wedren's (from Shudder To Think) score as the highlights. Not to be outdone by Renée, Richard and Latifah, Nivola does his own singing, but that just makes me think about Satisfaction. Where's Mallory when you need her?
1:41 - R for sexuality, language and drug use
========== X-RAMR-ID: 34229 X-Language: en X-RT-ReviewID: 846395 X-RT-TitleID: 10000884 X-RT-SourceID: 595 X-RT-AuthorID: 1146 X-RT-RatingText: 4/10
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