Richard Linklater's BLUE MOON (2025)

 "Don't write my eulogy in front of me!"

One of the things that is good about a break-up is that, normally, one don't have to talk and interact and have a long deep conversation with an ex at, say, one's wedding day. That is what this story kind of is, but from the ex's pov.

Not even some sketchy "he really is that short" Theatrical Aesthetic choices can't take away from Linklater's confidence with letting this material breathe like it should and getting a level of performance from Ethan Hawke that is higher than ever (and after 30 years!!)

Seriously though, the deep investment one has in Blue Moon is that Linklater, writer Robert Kaplow and the actors - all delivering excellent work, from Andrew Scott to Margaret Qualley to Bobby Cannavale and the supporting parts for EB White (so subtle with doing seemingly so little but also a lot with that) and even Hammerstein (so genuine in his compliments, little to no idea the bad blood between Hart and Rogers) in one key scene are just spot on - are all keyed in on showing something that can be tough to get right: what does it mean when someone who was, maybe still is, a genuinely talented person is slipping away into the worst version of themselves.

This isn't the first time one has seen this in a film or even a play, but what I find remarkable is how this is not so much a "staged play" (from reading and listening to interviews with Hawke about the process this went through work-shopping over ten years and seemed to always be intended as a film by this director and creative team) but that it is still a motion picture that has the sensitivity to performance and attention to time that a play can have. Maybe this still could work on a stage, then again one might lose all of those intense lower-pitched vocal tones that Hawke can get to more in acting for the camera, such as the many times he speaks with the bartender (Cannavale more or less playing much of the audience watching) and EB White, the one guy who seems to understand totally where Hart is coming from while having no proverbial skin in the game.

And all the while there is Hawke, sitting on the stool and meaning to get as much attention as he can from those in the bar, or particularly from Rogers once he arrives halfway through, when he is projecting to those around him, and it is one of his most unique and successful pieces of film acting - certainly the most transformative since First Reformed - because he shows us an entire life lived in even ten minutes of screen time.

There is so much to his Larry Hart (not least of which a Three Stooges impression that is one of my moments of the decade in cinema, pure cinema Ethan), and yet it is reductive to call it a fully tragic performance or character. Hart doesn't see it that way either, though there is denial and a sadness that he tries to mask and sometimes just cannot - not to mention the jealousy of seeing what he acknowledges is a massive success - and it is ultimately a film about... love.

That may even be reductive as well, but I am not so sure. In a way this reminded me of all things like a 1940's segment seen not cut up from PTA's Magnolia, just someone who is so achingly in need of love, though perhaps a difference is in the scope of the character of Hart and where the love goes. I found in particular the scenes with Qualley especially moving, in a role that gives her the opposite of like The Substance where she has to deliver a lot of monologuing and dialog and make this person feel real so quickly, and because her Elizabeth loves Hart... maybe just not *that* way. Or is she aware of what love Hart wants or needs or would be happy with?

There's so much rich inquiry into the creative process, into what it means to be left behind when others find successes, to how lives change and times change and you don't quite see it even as it is happening all at once (the compressed time that we see all of this is Linklater's metee and it still astonishes me he can pull it off). I did have one small reservation leaving the theater which were a few (ok more than a few) of those "trick" shots of Hawke meaning to look 5 feet tall when walking across some of the sets or against some of the actors.

 But with the exception of one scene where Hart is sitting next to White, I am not thinking about all of that hours later - instead I am still thinking about the ideas and that tender, vulnerable, aching look on Hawke's face in scene after scene.

And I forgot to mention and shouldn't: this is also quite disarmingly funny throughout.  I should also mention the Casablanca mentions were A plus.  And lastly... no, Oklahoma! is still not my cup of tea.