Something to watch tonight: Tuesday 26 March

C'mon C'mon (Mills, 2021)

When C’mon C’mon was released in New Zealand back in February 2022, I was given the opportunity to interview the writer-director Mike Mills for RNZ. At the time – and probably still– he was best-known for Beginners which won Christopher Plummer his Oscar back in 2012.

The timing didn’t work for broadcast as it was during that frustrating hinterland when the station was in summer programming mode.

I did the interview anyway and dropped the whole thing in the old Rancho Notorious podcast feed, which hadn’t been updated for years, but at least it is out there for people to listen to.

The distributors also asked me to host a Zoom Q&A with Mills at the Light House Cinema in Wellington and that was just as enjoyable. In fact, the additional questions from the audience improved things a fair bit!

Mills was lovely both times around and C’mon C’mon is one of my favourite films of 2022.

Joaquin Phoenix plays Johnny, a radio documentary maker who is asked by his sister (Gaby Hoffman) to look after his nine-year-old nephew Jesse (Woody Norman) while she attends to Jesse’s dad (Scoot McNairy), her estranged husband, who has had a bipolar episode.

That turns out to take much longer than anyone expects and Johnny has to take Jesse with him as he travels around the country interviewing people for his radio programme, which just happens to be about young people’s thoughts about the future.

As the film goes on, their frustrations with each other eventually turn into a kind of understanding and the film is a beautifully sensitive and loving character study of all of the principals.

I like Phoenix when he’s in humble mode and the whole film is given a magical quality thanks to Robbie Ryan’s luminous black and white cinematography.

Being an uncle can be the best thing in the world, if you let it, and C’mon C’mon is a testament to that.

---

---

Where to watch C’mon C’mon