Chris Knipp
12-09-2014, 03:34 PM
Michael Patrick Kelly: Isn't It Delicious (2013)
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KATHLEEN CHALFONT, KEIR DULLEA IN ISN'T IT DELICIOUS
End-of-life drama and life messages
Isn't It Delicious, about a well-off Connecticut woman whose impending death reunites her with her family, is a tiny zero-budget film made with a lot of love. But that does not save it from being overwrought, tiresome, and clichéd. The experienced Kathleen Chalfont has the lead as the smoking, hard-drinking Joan Weldon, who learns she has lung cancer. In between scenes where Joan rants and repents, we get to meet her three grown children, each in various states of disrepair and substance abuse. There's also a priest played by Franc McCourt's brother Malachy (who still has that brogue), and even a Tibetan monk brought in by son Teddy (Jonah Young). It's Teddy who tells the Buddhist story from whence comes the film title. In between the scenes of overexcited drama come hugs and life messages.
Kathleen Kiley's screenplay loses momentum midway by slipping away from Joan (though that may be a relief) and briefly following Teddy; sister Caroline (Alice Ripley), a lonely, boozy lesbian; and older brother Bobby (Nick Stevenson, who appears in "Orange Is the New Black"), an alcoholic who goes off the wagon for these events, and provides Joan with marijuana, which she has never tried. Expectations that this will be an intense family drama in the manner of Edward Albee or Tracy Letts are disappointed by this screenplay, whose analyses of personalities and family interactions are as superficial as its upbeat messages about redemption and life-affirmation.
Mia Dillon is featured as an estranged friend and in-law with whom Joan reconciles, and Robert LuPone (brother of Patti) plays Sam, an old friend. Sudanese former child soldier and current cover model Ger Duany has a few pungent lines as a limo driver. The score is by David Amram, who did the music for Splendor in the Grass and The Manchurian Candidate. The cinematography is by Axel Fischer. Keir Dullea, immortal from his lead role in Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey, still has a tidy, prim quality that suits this well-off white suburban Connecticut setting well. It seems odd that the children have left this world of mowed lawns and spacious white clapboard houses and entered into such trashy daily soap lives, but such are the ways of drama-heavy screenwriting.
Isn't It Delicious, 104 mins., debuted in May 2013 at Rainier and Tupolo festivals and played at half a dozen other small US fests. It opens in theaters Friday. 12 Dec. 2014 (NYC, Quad Cinema; also at the NoHo7 in Los Angeles and the Logan Theater in Chicago).
http://www.chrisknipp.com/newpictures/bj.jpg
KATHLEEN CHALFONT, KEIR DULLEA IN ISN'T IT DELICIOUS
End-of-life drama and life messages
Isn't It Delicious, about a well-off Connecticut woman whose impending death reunites her with her family, is a tiny zero-budget film made with a lot of love. But that does not save it from being overwrought, tiresome, and clichéd. The experienced Kathleen Chalfont has the lead as the smoking, hard-drinking Joan Weldon, who learns she has lung cancer. In between scenes where Joan rants and repents, we get to meet her three grown children, each in various states of disrepair and substance abuse. There's also a priest played by Franc McCourt's brother Malachy (who still has that brogue), and even a Tibetan monk brought in by son Teddy (Jonah Young). It's Teddy who tells the Buddhist story from whence comes the film title. In between the scenes of overexcited drama come hugs and life messages.
Kathleen Kiley's screenplay loses momentum midway by slipping away from Joan (though that may be a relief) and briefly following Teddy; sister Caroline (Alice Ripley), a lonely, boozy lesbian; and older brother Bobby (Nick Stevenson, who appears in "Orange Is the New Black"), an alcoholic who goes off the wagon for these events, and provides Joan with marijuana, which she has never tried. Expectations that this will be an intense family drama in the manner of Edward Albee or Tracy Letts are disappointed by this screenplay, whose analyses of personalities and family interactions are as superficial as its upbeat messages about redemption and life-affirmation.
Mia Dillon is featured as an estranged friend and in-law with whom Joan reconciles, and Robert LuPone (brother of Patti) plays Sam, an old friend. Sudanese former child soldier and current cover model Ger Duany has a few pungent lines as a limo driver. The score is by David Amram, who did the music for Splendor in the Grass and The Manchurian Candidate. The cinematography is by Axel Fischer. Keir Dullea, immortal from his lead role in Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey, still has a tidy, prim quality that suits this well-off white suburban Connecticut setting well. It seems odd that the children have left this world of mowed lawns and spacious white clapboard houses and entered into such trashy daily soap lives, but such are the ways of drama-heavy screenwriting.
Isn't It Delicious, 104 mins., debuted in May 2013 at Rainier and Tupolo festivals and played at half a dozen other small US fests. It opens in theaters Friday. 12 Dec. 2014 (NYC, Quad Cinema; also at the NoHo7 in Los Angeles and the Logan Theater in Chicago).