The film “Love is Strange,” directed by Ira Sachs where John Lithgow and Alfred Molina play a couple, forced to live apart due to the reality of New York’s real estate market, was already released in 2014. The film emotionally devastating for many. Following it, is Sachs’ “Little Men” which focuses on two families living on the same block in Brooklyn and highlights the struggles that come with balancing relationships and real estate. The script was co-written by both, Sachs and Mauricio Zacharias. “Little Men,” just as its predecessor, brings forth an interesting viewpoint, as its approach towards a problem is more practical than emotional. “Little Men” has been compared alongside “A Separation,” directed by Asghar Farhadi. The only difference is that both films contain a shattered family while focusing on entirely different parts of the world. Comparing “Little Men” and “Love Is Strange,” it is indeed true that the former lacks the depth of emotional tragedy that the latter encompasses. Although it is not foully substantiated, very few films achieve the greatness of “Love Is Strange.” Nonetheless, “Little Men” displays the power it possesses, giving birth to a world where the majority cannot differentiate between its characters and perspectives.
It is a step up for him and his family when Brian (Greg Kinnear) inherits his Brooklyn brownstone where his father is dead. He is married to Kathy (Jennifer Ehle) who is the family breadwinner while he works as an actor but isn’t very productive. Which is why he didn’t make enough money to purchase a brownstone. Their son is 13 years old now and goes by Jake (Theo Taplitz), he is done very reserved and struggles to make friends. That all changes when they make the move into the brownstone. With a dressmaking shop on the ground floor run by Leonor (Paulina Garcia) where there for decades, there must have been some changes as well. Block by block, Brian’s some and several other relatives were altering the neighborhood, which is why his father liked Leonor and would rather used to Greg. Brian’s sister (Talia Balsam) always wanted him to toss out Leonor and get a better break from the building, but Brian was always in favor for middle ground. This is his roundabout to the conversation he plans to make with her. He is trying his hardest to say this positively didn’t go very well.
“Little Men” runs for a mere 85 minutes and this works in its favor as the plot progresses at a breakneck speed. The tone is hurried and tense. Leonor’s son Tony (Michael Barbieri), who is 13, is a gregarious and friendly kid who forms an unusual bond with Jake. They have much in common, like their ambitions for Tony to become an actor and Jake a serious artist. With Jake unsteadily roller blading and Tony gliding over a kick scooter, they cross Brooklyn with music swelling around them. (These shots repeat. They are explosions of wordless emotion.)
However, things quickly spiral out of control in the adult world. Brian finds Leonor to be not only stubborn, but uncharacteristically unfriendly. Leonor defies every moving assumption about “class” that Brian probably didn’t even know existed. He doesn’t say this, but it is clear he expected her to be grateful that she got a break in rent for as long as she did. Leonor does not show gratitude and deference towards Brian, but rather the opposite. She inhales from her cigarette like a furious dragon. She isn’t scared of tearing limbs from a body.
The boys, caught in between their waring parents, are just unfortunate casualties of their actions.
“Little Men” portrays a dramatic set up from the themes of 1930s anger surrounding capitalism and communism (tenants versus landlords). For some odd reason, melodrama seems to have a bad impression like makes people assume of it as just a romantic tear jerker, yet no other genre comes close to portraying social and economic facilitation the way it does. There is no way to be euphemistic about losing one’s home and treasure chest. It’s everything for the people involved and, in fact, life and death. Sachs’ approach to melodrama is quite human scaled, almost offhand which is one of his best qualities as a cinematographer. While his shots are controlled, they are not overly planned or ostentatious. He cares about the order of daily life and how that order gets altered as something changes.
Greg Kinnear is brilliant as a man whose life has veered off in multiple directions, somehow hiding underneath the surface is his unclear disappointment at how his life turned out, to his contradictory feelings towards the artistic goals of his son. His frustration at Leonor’s attitude illustrates how Brian’s warped personality has residual traces of absolute entitlement. That his wife earns the money and he has to look after the children is something that embarrasses Brian, but it’s something he can’t allow himself to say out loud.
The two child actors that have been cast as Jake and Tony seem so comfortable that it is like they came off the streets and started performing for the camera. “Little Men” is definitely not patronizing to serious children that are ambitious. In what seems like the Meisner technique, Tony is in an acting class, and it is crucial to catch him in his glory when he is in action during a repetition exercise (and it is an excellent scene) because it verifies all of Tony’s ambitions are real. He is wanting it. Tony lacks fear; he is unreservedly affectionate towards strangers; he is transparent.
As Leonor, Paulina García has delivered one of the year’s best portrayals. To Greg and Kathy, she is this immensely irritating, witch like figure, but that’s because they are looking through the prism from their own point of view.
García keeps her emotions in check while she performs. You can sense an undercurrent of pent-up rage and contempt, however. She is terrifying, and she is terrified at the same time. When she extinguishes her cigarette on the sidewalk, she is visualizing what Brian and Kathy’s faces would look like under her boot. She is not a super villain, she is longing for survival.
Sachs does not possess a tourist’s outlook about the city. This is because native new Yorkers witness several movies and television series that are based in Manhattan and they always think to themselves, “The apartments are too huge. Hallways are very wide. To get the bed frame upstairs, I had to chop it in half.” During the given moment, and with an increasing number of people in the vicinity, apartments are overstuffed and crammed, so New York is only for the affluent. What more is lost in the process when a city forgets or turns a blind eye to its history? The answer is that loss is what ‘little men’ live on.
In the final scene of IT by Stephen King, Bill Denbrough said: ‘Children’s world in their eyes is appealing, but relegating everything to adulthood brings forth its own allure… A grown-up who is able to analyze a child’s optimistic view of the world is an appealing concept. How integrating is it ?? Understanding that courage and love define the boundaries of existence is such an insightful revelation.’ In “Little Men,” the friendship between Jake and Tony is created from this type of shared and bittersweet understanding. Even at the age of 13 years, Jake and Tony girdle their hands and are aware of the escalating distance that their parents have created. Do they really understand how delicate relationships can be? Or the amount of work they need to spend in ensuring its growth? For any child irrespective of where he is, it is a very ardently worrying situation, and these questions stay firmly ingrained around long after the film ends.
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