Sherrybaby
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Movie Reviews of Sherrybaby
Movie Review: Uncompromisingly realistic, beautifully realized
Summary: 5 Stars
She is what she is. She is not able to restrain herself. She needs gratification. She can't postpone it. She succumbs to whatever it is, sex, heroin, alcohol, nicotine...love. She is impulsive and she flies off the handle easily. She doesn't know that she behaves badly. She doesn't know that is not the way to dress. Or perhaps she does. She needs to be gratified, and so probably that is why she dresses that way.
She was sexually abused by her father who loved her. But who does she love? She desperately wants her daughter to love her. Do you love me? she asks. Say, "I love you, Mommie." The child does, but suddenly--and this is the denouement of the movie--Sherry realizes that there is some question about whether the child should love her. Yes, she has the stretch marks, but really does she deserve the title of "mother"? And does she love herself? Probably not, and maybe that is her biggest problem. It is said that women who are always seeking sex are really seeking a love that they cannot find. One always feels that if only they would pick the right man. But this is an illusion. There is no right man until she is the right woman.
Maggie Gyllenhaal does an outstanding job of becoming this woman who is lost in this world without a compass as to how she should behave and why, who is lost to everything but her immediate feelings. She is a child emotionally and she cannot understand why it is that life is so hard for her and why the world is so cruel.
This is a masterful portrait of a kind of person that is part of humanity. A good person at heart, not someone who would do others deliberate harm, but a person who is blind to who she is and to how others see her. Into what world does she belong? is a question I kept asking myself. I don't know the answer.
Laurie Collyer's direction is exquisite. The players and especially the little girl are wonderfully directed. Everything is like the people next door without a hint of anything phony. The contemporary Garden State setting is real and the details and the atmosphere are as genuine as the New Jersey Turnpike. And the ending surprises. It is perfect but in a way that I suspect most viewers will not be able to predict. I know it surprised me.
My hat is off to Laurie Collyer and Maggie Gyllenhaal. Thank you for this modest little masterpiece and for not compromising reality or putting in any unnecessary fig leaves or giving in to any notions of political correctness. This is just a pure slice of life movie with a beginning, a middle and an end, beautifully realized. And yes it is rated R.
Movie Review: Stellar performance drives this harrowing movie about addiction and recovery
Summary: 5 Stars
I'll start with a warning: "Sherrybaby" is a very downbeat, gloomy movie. Sherry Swanson, played brilliantly by Maggie Gyllenhaal, has had a very depressing life and the movie's bare-bones look at her attempts to reform and become a good mother to her daughter hits some abysmal lows in the way she continues to be degraded by the harsh judgments of the world and, predominantly, herself. It's just not a feel good movie, so anyone looking for frivolity or endless repeat viewing had best look elsewhere.
Now, having gotten that out of the way, I want to implore you to watch "Sherrybaby" anyway, because while the movie isn't bouncy fun it is an unflinchingly honest and devastating portrait of a young woman in crisis. Sherry makes some bad choices, sure, but thanks to Gyllenhaal you see the extent of the damage that has been done to her, and you find yourself on the edge of your seat because you desperately want her to be all right in the end. To say that Sherry's life hasn't gone according to plan would be an egregious understatement. By sixteen she was performing for seedy older men for money under the moniker 'Lolita,' hooked on heroin, and it is implied that she was sexually molested by her father. Most of her old acquaintances are either dead of overdoses or in jail, and she has no idea where her daughter's father is -- assuming he's still alive, that is. In Gyllenhaal's blank stare you can feel every wound and imagine every dream that has been dashed forever in Sherry's bleak existence, and in her prematurely world-weary creases the fear that she will never get the normal life she so desperately craves becomes palpable. It is a performance that is at once bold and understated, and the fact that Gyllenhaal failed to get nominated for an Academy Award seems to be the final nail in the coffin of that institution's ability to reward such daring indie performances as this one. It's a triumph so lived-in that you can almost smell the stale aroma of cigarettes following around her. The supporting players are also very good, but this is Gyllenhaal's vehicle, and it is her work that makes the film work so well.
And what a film! Sherry's fumbling attempts at motherhood and sobriety don't tug at your heartstrings so much as rip them out and scrape them across the floor, but rarely does that experience feel so exhilarating as it does here. "Sherrybaby" is not a movie for the faint of heart, but it is a movie for anyone who has a heart -- and it will stay with you long after the final reel. How many movies can you honestly say that about?
Movie Review: The Plight of the Addict
Summary: 5 Stars
Laurie Collyer both wrote and directed this very fine little film that examines the world in which addicted people live, even after they have 'paid their debt to society' by being imprisoned. She does not play to the sympathy of the audience: she rather empathizes with one woman's plight in her struggle to gain control of a life she has never been able to successfully assemble.
Sherry Swanson (a brilliant tour de force by Maggie Gyllenhaal) has been in prison for robbery, drug possession and heroin addiction for several years and as the film opens she is released to her hometown in New Jersey where she is assigned a parole officer (Giancarlo Esposito) and a 'safe haven' home. She longs to see her five-year-old daughter Alexis (Ryan Simpkins) whom she barely knows and who has been living with her brother
Bobby (the excellent Brad William Henke) and his wife Lynette (Bridget Barkan). After encountering much prejudice and abuse heaped on ex-cons looking for work, Sherry manages to find a job working with kids and tries desperately to re-connect with Alexis but is rebuffed by Lynette and warned by Bobby that should she bring drugs in the house he will send her back to prison.
Sherry stumbles through her out-of-prison existence, connecting with old friends at an AA meeting, having a fling with her old flame Dean (Danny Trejo), attending a birthday party for Alexis given at her parents home where her father (Sam Bottoms) comforts her in a sexually intrusive way, and struggling with her roommates until she moves out on her own. She aches from not belonging, from the fact that her life on the 'outside' is as much a prison as on the 'inside', and she returns to drugs. Given an ultimatum by her parole officer she finally thinks she can put her life back together, but a planned outing with daughter Alexis forces Sherry to face the fact that she is not capable of the skills of mothering and she is able finally to ask for help from her caring brother.
Maggie Gyllenhaal is Sherry with every fiber of her being. It is a performance worthy of top honors. The beauty of the film is the fact that it does not opt for Hollywood happy endings: it merely stops with many questions unanswered - as is the case in life with people who suffer the agonies of addiction. It is beautifully acted and filmed and it deserves the attention of not only lovers of fine film, but also people who want to try to understand the horrors of drug addiction in a society unprepared to cope with it. Highly Recommended. Grady Harp, January 07
Movie Review: Looking forward to more from Gyllenhall and Trejo after these performances
Summary: 5 Stars
Sherrybaby is the story about starting life over when you've hit rock bottom. Maggie Gyllenhaal plays Sherry, a 22 year-old ex-junkie on parole with a sincere desire to turn her life around and regain custody of her 5 year-old daughter. While Sherry was in jail, her daughter lived with Sherry's brother and his wife, and the sister-in-law now has an iron resolve about keeping the child and not returning her to the flaky ex-con mother.
Actor Maggie Gyllenhaal expertly captures the spirit of a woman who desires change, and desperately wants to be a mother, but for whom motherhood and stability do not come naturally. The climax of the move features her attempt on a day on the town with her daughter, a disaster of a day despite all of Sherry's best efforts. Throughout the movie, Sherry battles addiction, past demons, and the hard luck reality that not many employers or professionals want to take a chance on an ex-con. Since she's known nothing else, Sherry often turns to using her body to get what she wants in the "real world."
Gyllenhall's outstanding performance is complimented by that of Danny Trejo as a tough, tattoo-ed recovering addict who provides Sherry with stability and wisdom. Actor Trejo's appearance is that of an ex-con (which he is in real life) tough guy who knows a bit about how the world works, but in this role, he plays a spiritual man with a soft, kind resolve under his tough exterior. His character is a guardian angel in an unlikely disguise.
Sherrybaby proves once again that Maggie Gyllenhaal is one of the most outstanding actors of her generation, and gives Trejo a chance to shine in a leading role. I look forward to following the careers of these terrific actors.
Movie Review: A tale of desperation & a mother's love
Summary: 5 Stars
I watched this movie after hearing all the hype abt Maggie Gyllenhaal's performance, and she truly does live up to the hype. Ms Gylenhaal brings a tragic vulnerability to her role, whilst at the same time being totally unscrupulous and indiscriminating in trying to survive after being released on parole from prison. She does not hesitate to use sex to her advantage, whether to gratify her desires, to obtain a job, or just as a means of releasing her stress. Yet, despite appearing a total loser, what redeems her is her love for her 5 year old daughter Lexie, who is being taken care of by Sherry's brother and his wife. Her desire to be a good mom is in conflict with all the other obstacles standing in her way, i.e. staying off drugs & trouble, & getting a job. Initially, we get the impression that Sherry truly deserves all she gets, but later, we get to know an underlying reason for her problems, something that is rooted in Sherry's own turbulent family history, which is hinted at in the movie. Maggie Gylenhaal's performance in this movie is truly deserving of merit, and I was disappointed that her performance was overlooked at the Oscars...she has been underrated as an actress, shining in other movies like Secretary, and I look forward to her other efforts on the silver screen. As for the movie, it is a tale of desperation and love, and is not pretty, one really sees the harsh realities of life as faced by Sherry, yet the underlying message is one of hope and redemption.