Every once in awhile the Sundance Film Festival will send us Badgers a special cinematic treat. Madison is lucky enough to have a Sundance Cinema located at Hilldale Mall, which means the festival will usually give us a special screening of one of the festival's highlights. This year's film is none other than the winner of the festival's U.S. Dramatic Competition Grand Jury Prize, ""Like Crazy"". Director Drake Doremus' new film is full of fresh talent and it one of the most honest portrayals of young love in recent memory.
The film is a bare-boned character piece. It starts when a British university student (Felicity Jones) falls for an American college boy (Anton Yelchin), only to be separated from him when she is banned from the U.S. after overstaying her visa. This complicates their relationship, forcing them to be apart for months at a time.
Throughout the film their relationship fluctuates. At first, the relationship is a blessing because their love is able to withstand the longest distances and time. Yet, it slowly becomes a curse because they are unable to move on with their lives even after the situation has become a lost cause. These characters' struggles anchor the film's success.
However, there is so much other fantastic work sprinkled throughout the film that it becomes difficult not to accept it as something truly intimate and visionary. First, there is phenomenal acting throughout the film. Yelchin, who you might know from ""Charlie Bartlett"" or ""Star Trek,"" has taken his acting to a new level. Before now, he had shown that he had a Marty McFlyness to him that was very likeable. After seeing him in this film you're convinced he can do anything.
His performance is perfectly matched by the equally talented Jones. This is the biggest role she's had in a film to date but it won't be for long. It's also worth mentioning the performance by Jennifer Lawrence, who was recently nominated for an Oscar for her performance in ""Winter's Bone."" It's a small role with almost no dialogue but it could have been the crack in the ship that caused the project to sink if she'd handled it poorly.
Another great feature of the film is its approach to romance. It's refreshing to see a pure and straightforward presentation of a romantic drama. The only pure romances coming out of Hollywood now are the crappy ""Love Actually"" spinoffs that have fifteen different relationships going on at once so they can get away without actually saying something. ""Like Crazy"" helps fill that void.
The best thing a romance can do these days is to find something new about relationships and take the conversation to a new level. This film does just that with its unrivaled look at the modern long distant relationship.
The rest of the film's success should be credited to Doremus, who not only directed the film but also wrote it. Having only a fifty page outline, the majority of the film was completely improvised. This new style of mumblecore is an extremely challenging and risky approach to filmmaking. If Doremus didn't completely trust his story, his actors and his guys in the editing room this film could have easily been an overextended train wreck of melodrama. He lets the relationship develop in an honest way without showing us all the stereotypical moments of emotional manipulation that you'd get in a lesser film. He fumbles with the ending of the film but you've got to give him Brownie points for sticking with his message and taking us somewhere original.
So if you missed your chance to see it here in Madison, don't worry. Paramount bought the film for a festival high of $4 million last week and it will get a nationwide limited release early next fall. It's a true achievement for independent cinema and an experience you won't want to miss.
