Worth: $15.00
FilmInk rates movies out of $20 — the score indicates the amount we believe a ticket to the movie to be worth
Cast:
Tom Hanks, Mariana Trevino, Rachel Keller, Manuel Garcia-Rulfo, Mike Birbiglia
Intro:
… shows that the old trope of the grumpy man who turns nice when he realises how kind the world can be, is a heart-winning formula.
You could put Tom Hanks on a desert island talking to a basketball and he could still engage us. Oh, wait a minute…
This new comedy drama from Marc Forster (Monster’s Ball, Finding Neverland) has lots of scenes of Hanks just pottering about and talking to himself. Mostly, his character Otto is a grumpy old man who likes everything just so, and who will stick his nose into his neighbours’ business to make sure it stays like that.
The film is a Hollywood remake of a successful Swedish 2015 film A Man Called Ove (and/or an adaptation of the book of that name by Fredrik Backman). It shows that the old trope of the grumpy man who turns nice when he realises how kind the world can be, is a heart-winning formula
Hanks, who is pretty much uncontested as today’s equivalent of James Stewart, brings all his affability to the role. He can be so cuddly and warm that it is almost unbelievable, but he has brought it off before, for example in the more original A Beautiful Day in the Neighbourhood.
The fact that we know from frame one that Otto is going to be an absolute softie might count against the film for some, but again, it is all in the way it is done. The support playing is hugely important too, and the cast of gentle eccentrics that inhabit the perfect little cul de sac that Otto presides over, are all good in their roles. A shout out to Mariana Trevino as his Mexican neighbour, who softens his heart. She has oodles of charm and steals many of the scenes that she is in. It is fair to say that the film has slightly unnecessary touches (a nod to opposing transphobia, which looks very written-in for effect, an odd plea to save American car manufacturing from the challenges of European and Japanese brands and so on). It can also get a bit treacly at times, and that alone may drive some people further into being a curmudgeon.
It is folksy if not actually utopian. A Man Called Otto showcases a super nice America in a hermetically sealed kind of way, so that very little grit or tension can really obtrude. In some ways, it is hard to square this with the actual America in which 70+ million voted for a crotch-grabbing quasi-Fascist. A man who wanted to build a wall that would have kept out people like Otto’s new neighbour. But, maybe that is the point. Countries, like the people that make them, have a good side as much as a harsh one, and a celebration of such can be timely. If you want a well-acted feel good movie with few surprises, this might be the one for you.
