Silver Linings Playbook Manages An Impressive Tightrope Walk
By Victoria Pietrus in Arts & Entertainment on Dec 7, 2012 10:02PM
It is magical that writer and director David O. Russell improves his record from 2010 best picture nominee The Fighter with this year’s guaranteed Oscar-contender Silver Linings Playbook. Based off a 2008 novel by Matthew Quick, Russell returns viewers to the East coast and explores the messiness and lyricism descended from love that doesn’t come easily.
Pat Solitano (Bradley Cooper) has just been released from his court-ordered stay at a mental health institution; he was committed after finding his wife and the history teacher together in no place other than the shower, and so he nearly beat the man to death. He returns home after his stay with his doting mother (Jacki Weaver) and his obsessive-compulsive and recently unemployed, father (Robert De Niro) whose violent outbursts as the Philadelphia Eagles’ stadium have him banned for life. From the moment you meet him, Solitano seems convinced that the love between him and his wife is still very real and that the restraining order against him is just a roadblock in the way of their happiness. It is at a dinner at a friend’s house where Solitano meets Tiffany Maxwell (Jennifer Lawrence) whose sexual proclivities are her preferred coping mechanism after the tragic death of her husband, a local policeman. They bond—tumultuously—over the impractical goal of competing in a local dance competition, and it is glorious to watch them run around, bicker, and then salsa.
What’s so great is how Russell is able to pull off another story about sports, struggle, and love, except this time, there is an added dose of crazy. This movie is knee-slappingly hilarious, largely due to its sensational dialogue, unaffected emotion, and perfectly delivered lines. With Chris Tucker as the silly, nuthouse escapee, Anupam Kher as the deadpan psychologist, Lawrence as the young, aggressively vulnerable widow, or De Niro as the unhinged, lovable gambling maniac, you will be sucked in and enamored of this community of misfits. Cooper is astounding; this departure from the typical roles he played in Wedding Crashers or The Hangover could not be more impressive. Jennifer Lawrence is incredibly confident, and no amount of her bouncing around in tight clothes could successfully distract viewers from noting her masterfully subtle emotion and total command of such a delicate character.
You will watch Silver Linings Playbook, and then you will want to watch it again very soon—not because it is a particularly complex, profound, or scintillating romantic comedy, but because it will literally have you guffawing ungraciously and then promptly dabbing the tears in your eyes.