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BEING FRANK
Director: Miranda Bailey Cast: Logan Miller, Jim Gaffigan, Isabelle Phillips, Samantha Mathis, Anna Gunn, Daniel Rashid, Gage Polchlopek, Alex Karpovsky MPAA
Rating: Running Time: 1:49 Release Date: 6/14/19 (limited) |
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Review by Mark Dujsik | June 13, 2019 We can't really hate Frank (Jim Gaffigan), who has spent about 20 years juggling two wives and two pairs of kids because of love and a warped sense of responsibility, but we can get pretty close to hating the cad. Being Frank makes the mistake of trying to sympathize with him, though, by seeing his lies through the eyes of an eager-to-be-loved son and by presenting his misadventures in keeping up the two-family deception into a situational comedy. The thinking behind Glen Lakin's screenplay, perhaps, is that it's more difficult for us to dislike a lying, controlling, and neglectful philanderer if we're too busy laughing at what a mess he makes of things. It's a reasonable assumption, except that Lakin also wants to deal with the psychological and emotional repercussions of Frank's long-running dishonesty. Director Miranda Bailey's movie wants it both ways, which—while appropriate, considering the story—gives off the impression of cognitive, thematic, and tonal dissonance. Frank's double life is discovered by his son Phillip (Logan Miller), his first child with his first wife Laura (Anna Gunn). For years, when Frank allegedly has been going on business trips, he actually has been spending time with Bonnie (Samantha Mathis), his second wife, and their two kids Eddie (Gage Polchlopek) and Kelly (Isabelle Phillips). Phillip, who wants to leave home for college in New York City, essentially blackmails his dad for tuition money to help keep the secret, pretending to be the son of Frank's invented best friend. He mostly likes watching his emotionally absent and unsupportive old man sweat. Eventually, Phillip discovers that, in his father's mind, there's more to the deception than the obvious motives (sex, control, or the thrill of getting away with something so elaborate), and the teen helps his dad keep up the lies as the two families inch closer to each other. Most of this is the stuff of a screwball sitcom, which might work if Frank were purely a buffoon or if the emotional stakes weren't as high. He isn't, though, and they are, leaving the third act (and primarily Gunn and Mathis) to carry the weight of the real toll of Frank's betrayals. Being Frank acknowledges the pain the eponymous character has caused, although, just like the man himself, the movie's narrow focus ultimately and strangely paints him as the real victim here. Copyright © 2019 by Mark Dujsik. All rights reserved. |
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