Tuesday, July 17, 2012

Saturday in The Office



During a lazy weekend a few months ago, I caught up with some of my favorite pals from NBC's The Office in some of their more recent independent feature film roles.  Creed Bratton, who plays wonderfully creepy Creed on TV, plays equally creepy on the big screen as Uncle James in Azazel Jacobs coming-of-age tale Terri. Played wonderfully by newcomer Jacob Wysocki, Terri is a teenager that should be full of angst but can't seem to gather the energy it would take to care.  Overweight, living with an uncle on the verge of senility, with no parents to be found, or really friends for that matter, Terri lets us in to his quiet world of quirkiness.  After missing a lot of school, Terri is pulled into the office of Assistant Principal Fitzgerald (John C. Reilly).  Fitzgerald is the kind of Assistant Principal that most of us would have liked, but never would have admitted to it; he genuinely cares for Terri, even if he doesn't always know the best way to go about doing that.

Even discovering that maybe his friendship with Fitzgerald places him in a category that everyone else already did (the dude wears pajamas to school everyday, need I say more?), Terri grudgingly gives in to becoming friends with the other less desirables in Fitzgerald's posse, such as Chad (Bridger Zadina), a kid who constantly pulls out his hair.  When one of the more popular girls in school, Heather (Olivia Crocicchia) allows a boy to do a very private thing in a very public place, she becomes an outcast that only someone the likes of Terri can sympathize and reach out towards. 

This is where Terri could become really cliché; the part of most teen movies where the lovable loser gets the girl, is accepted by the cool kids, and becomes valedictorian and prom king. However, this film stays away from the coming-of-age playbook and stays true to life, or at least the life we have been presented.  As the tagline states, "We've all been there."  The scenarios may be different but the emotions are the same.

Roger Ebert declared this one of the best movies of the year in 2011.  I wouldn't go that far.  It's slow paced and kind of trickles into an ending, but if you like movies that do not really take you anywhere but allow you a snippet of an inside look into someone's life for a while, give this movie a shot.




The other film I took in was Michael J. Weithorn's directorial film debut, A Little Help, starring Jenna Fischer as Laura, a dental hygienist who is dealing with the aftermath of losing her husband and trying to handle her 12 year old son. This is no Pam Beesly-Halpert; unless maybe you limit your comparison to the drunken Pam at the Dundies.

That is because we spend the majority of the movie watching Laura try to escape her humdrum life through a can of Budweiser. Not very content with her status quo, Laura falls into an even deeper sense of dreariness once her husband is out of the picture, leaving her alone with her already meddlesome family. To everyone Laura is a screw-up, and her reluctance to sue the doctor in her husband's case in order to provide a better life for her and her son is perfect evidence that without "a little help" Laura would be falling off the deep end with no safety net.

The only person that sees Laura in a different light is her brother-in-law; the other member of the family who tends to try and sneak out of family together time whenever he has the chance. The fact that he would like to spend that away time with Laura is just another issue for her to try and handle. There is not a lot that happens in this movie, but what does occur feels authentic for the characters.

While it could have played off very unrealistic for Laura to go with the lie bratty son Dennis (Daniel Yelsky) tells everyone at his new school about the way his father died; it doesn't. After all the put downs and lack of trust to be able to do anything right that Laura receives from her own family, it's not hard to imagine that fessing up is not high on her list of priorities.

 Like Terri, this could be considered an antithesis to the most fast-paced, action-filled movies out there. Although there is a small glimmer of hope that we are leaving her a little better off than where we found her, Laura's storyline does not wrap up in a pretty little bow. But if nothing else, maybe these two stories will allow the viewer to see their own struggles as survivable.

 Besides, it sure beats a day in the office next to a co-worker like Dwight Shrute.

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