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Film review

Rachel Getting Married

by Sean Burns

Jonathan Demme’s Rachel Getting Married is dedicated to the memory of Robert Altman. Borrowing the late master’s roving camerawork, crowded frames and famously wandering ear, it transforms a weekend wedding party into a tapestry of jumbled humanity. Like most Altman movies, it feels more discovered than staged, and you’ll immediately want to go back for a second viewing, as there’s so much bustling around the margins it’s impossible to absorb everything at once.

But while Demme might have absorbed Altman’s technique, he’s not interested in mimicking his sardonic sensibility. Perhaps more than any other filmmaker working today, Jonathan Demme possesses a deeply humanist temperament; a contagious affinity for his characters, no matter how exasperating they might be.

And Kym’s plenty exasperating, believe me. Played by Anne Hathaway, who’s barely recognizable beneath a stringy Louise Brooks bob and an omnipresent cloud of sarcasm and cigarette smoke, Kym’s scored a weekend pass from rehab for her older sister Rachel’s wedding.

Rosemarie DeWitt’s Rachel is right to be weary, as Kym can’t help but suck all the energy out of a room and refocus it on herself. To be upstaged at your own wedding is the cruelest of fates, not to mention the stuff of seriously cringe-worthy comedy. But there’s something else simmering beneath the surface here that Demme acknowledges only obliquely at first. It goes beyond the flat narcissism that fueled similar, much shallower shenanigans in last year’s Margot at the Wedding, for Kym might be overbearing, but she’s also obviously overcompensating.

We must tread lightly here, as one of the great pleasures of Jenny Lumet’s screenplay lies in the way crucial information is parceled out only gradually, reshaping our understanding of scenes that came before. Suffice to say that years ago there was a tragedy, the kind of devastation from which no family ever truly recovers, and what’s most miraculous about Rachel Getting Married is just how expertly Demme navigates Lumet’s hairpin tonal shifts. The film swings from hilarious to crushing and then back again, sometimes within the space of a single scene. There’s so much joy in this movie, and also such pain.

Demme has always had a penchant for packing his pictures with multicultural musicians, so naturally Rachel’s wedding is an Indian/Hawaiian-themed extravaganza of vibrant fashions and live performances, with her dearly beloved Sidney (TV on the Radio frontman Tunde Adebimpe in comically oversized eyeglasses) singing Neil Young lyrics instead of vows. The guests, including everybody from Robyn Hitchcock to Fab Five Freddy, take turns at the bandstand throughout the weekend, providing a jubilant and varied score to guide these damaged souls toward something resembling to forgiveness.

Hathaway is a revelation, all frayed nerve endings and chain-smoking anxiety atop a hopeless longing she can’t quite articulate. (Somebody should cast her in a Liza Minnelli biopic, stat.) As long-suffering Rachel, DeWitt delivers a fittingly stealthy performance, simmering with resentment in the background while her spotlight is perpetually stolen. Bill Irwin plays their father with an aching, wide-open exuberance. Hurling his lanky frame into overly emotive embraces while doting on his daughters, Irwin paints the heartbreaking portrait of a man who has suffered so much in the past, he seems determined to revel in and savor any stray moment of happiness that comes his way.

Alas, the same can not be said for Kym and Rachel’s mother, played by Debra Winger. In a scant amount of screen time, Winger shows us someone shut down by grief, responding to sorrow by refusing to engage. She’s present, but closed. Only Kym can rattle long-buried feelings to the foreground, in a scene so nakedly powerful it’s almost unbearable to watch.

Such moments are where Demme’s goofy, inclusive humanism and lively settings work more like a life preserver for the audience. It’s easy to imagine Lumet’s scenario as a brutal melodrama.

There’s so much damned exuberance and life carrying on in and outside the frame, Rachel Getting Married exudes hopefulness beyond the tears. Altman would be pleased.