SummaryWhen Margot, 28, meets Daniel, their chemistry is intense and immediate. But Margot suppresses her sudden attraction; she is happily married to Lou, a cookbook writer. When she learns that Daniel lives across the street from them, the certainty about her domestic life shatters. She and Daniel steal moments throughout the steaming Toronto...
SummaryWhen Margot, 28, meets Daniel, their chemistry is intense and immediate. But Margot suppresses her sudden attraction; she is happily married to Lou, a cookbook writer. When she learns that Daniel lives across the street from them, the certainty about her domestic life shatters. She and Daniel steal moments throughout the steaming Toronto...
Take This Waltz, Sarah Polley's honest, sure-footed, emotionally generous second feature. Ms. Williams, one of the bravest and smartest actresses working in movies today, portrays a young woman who is indecisive and confused, but never passive.
That's not to say the sobering Take This Waltz is nearly as emotionally agonizing as "Blue Valentine." Still, it's every bit as truthful in its examination of the evolution, and subsequent devolution, of love.
This is the first movie in years I walked out on, even asked and got my money back. The cinema manager said he understood as everyone was saying how bad it was. Badly written drivel, come on the woman's wants to write, the man is an artist who pulls a rickshaw! The in and out Of focus, the **** not waste your money nor your time
This film blew me away with its honest and unabashed look at monogamy. Michelle Williams is stunning ( as always) in her depiction of a young married woman who had married her best friend instead of her lover (which many of us do in our first marriages) Seen from a mature woman's viewpoint, I thought Polley addressed some real issues surrounding marriage, love and infidelity. Well Done!
Despite a few tonal and structural missteps, this intelligent, perceptive drama proves as intimately and gratifyingly femme-focused as Polley's 2006 debut, "Away From Her."
Canadian actor Kirby's bedroom-eyes shtick is infused with just the right amount of creepiness, as Polley's film plays with the blurry line between soulful romantic obsession and just plain stalking.
Polley has a sometimes graceful understanding of emotional temperate zones and Williams, when she isn't being zombielike, is touching. But Margot comes across as such an elusive and unsympathetic twit that you wonder why we should care about her.
In theory, these are twentysomethings we're talking about. But they walk and talk like fortysomethings or fiftysomethings, such is their dullness and self-absorption.
Likable,quirk-ily original and at times laugh out loud funny. This is a very strange film that gets better as it goes on. I found myself really warming to Margot, outstandingly played by Michelle Williams, as we are drawn into her life with Lou and her subsequent affair with Daniel. The outcome is honest and tinged with sadness. The film has stayed with me for months now and Sarah Polley is to be commended for her delicate handling of such a beautiful story albeit in a minor key. If for no other reason see the film for the stunning performance of Michelle Williams.
his movie had an interesting theme that was explored in a cinematically artistic way, but unfortunately, the film hesitated, stumbled, fell down a winding path, and landed in an awkward place. The eternal question of which situation is preferable--a loving marriage with the comfort of history, family and endearing quirks, eccentricities, and traditions, or a passionate love affair that sends one into outer space and around the moon and back before the inevitable crash landing on planet Earth? This film explores that dilemma, but the resolution is vague and ambiguous. Margot, played by Michelle Williams, meets a handsome stranger in Nova Scotia, Daniel, played by Luke Kirby, who happens to be a tourist at Fort Louisbourg in Cape Breton, where Margot has been assigned to rewrite their marketing brochure. Margot and Daniel meet briefly at the fort in an encounter which involves a re-enactment put on for the tourists. Daniel then shows up sitting right next to her on the plane back to Toronto, and then shares a cab with her at the airport only to find that they live across the street from each other. This is difficult to believe, but in this film, fiction is stranger than truth. They have already fallen in love and neither one can admit it, because Margot's 5-year marriage to Lou, played by Seth Rogen, who has to do serious acting for once in a film that is actually not of the gross and vulgar variety, is precious to her. (If they are supposed to unhappily married, the script fails to convey that at every level.) Margot, however, is already madly in love with neighbor Daniel, despite the fact that he is a frustrated, unknown artist who ekes out a living as a rickshaw driver, which is a Toronto tourist-industry phenomenon. Her husband Lou is a successful cookbook author. Even though it is sociologically well documented that women value a man's stature in the world more than they value looks, Margot not only falls in love with this drifter, she leaves a good husband for him, when it is obvious that she had only two choices: 1) resist him; 2) have a brief affair and get him out of her system. Before Margot leaves her husband, there is a period where the film intelligently explores the never-never land of being both happily married and madly in love with someone else, a situation that is mostly fantasy as long as nothing happens. Just when you think Margot is going to become strong in her resolve and not make a serious mistake, which would have involved having a scenario where Daniel's magical power over her gets destroyed, she caves in and leaves her husband. Thus begins the bizarre last act of the film, where Daniel moves into a fabulous Toronto loft that he can somehow afford as a rickshaw driver in a city where real estate is prohibitively expensive. Margot moves in with him, and at last they can make love, which turns out to be not just wild passion, but kinky sex involving third parties. This is completely out of synch with the essential nature of their romance, but no explanation for their behavior is offered. And finally, just like in a marriage to a nice guy, the two eventually settle into a routine where they spend a lot of time watching television. In the end, does Margot realize she made a mistake? Perhaps, but director Sarah Polley offers no firm resolution, and we never know if Margot can return to her husband or resign herself to life with a rickshaw-driving partner. Or if, when all the dust settles, she ends up with nothing and no one, but without regret because it was worth the ride, or the waltz, as in Take This Waltz, and who better than Leonard Cohen can emblemize a life philosophy based solely on carpe diem.
After seeing the reviews, I was very disappointed when I saw the movie. Although Michelle Williams and Susan Silverman gave outstanding performances, the male characters were unrealistic. I couldn't believe that Williams's character was interested in either of them.
Starring a truly insufferable protagonist, Take This Waltz is just a truly aggravating experience. While the acting is fine, the writing feels like it was written by a 10-year old who just discovered sex and thought this script was a good idea. The film is the grating kind of indie cinema that believes it is offering interesting insights into a certain topic, but is actually offering absolutely nothing of value. Here, the topic is marriage and infidelity. Tragically for Take This Waltz, these topics have been broached by better, less annoying films. While authentically written and well acted by Michelle Williams and Seth Rogen, this is simply an unpleasant experience all-around. Never quite as insightful as it thinks it is, Take This Waltz is that awful kind of indie film that shows quite expertly why a bad blockbuster is better than a bad indie film any day of the week. Boring and annoying, Take This Waltz is not a film I would recommend.
Despite creative cinematography, a promising and appealing cast, the writing in "Take This Waltz" was disappointing and the story lacked drama, pace, even basic logic.
Production Company
Joe's Daughter,
Mongrel Media,
TF1 Droits Audiovisuels,
Téléfilm Canada,
Ontario Media Development Corporation (OMDC),
The Harold Greenberg Fund,
Astral Media,
Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC),
Movie Central,
Super Ecran,
The Movie Network