Silver Linings Playbook (4/30/2013)

Rated R for language and some sexual content/nudity.

Starring Bradley Cooper, Jennifer Lawrence, Robert De Niro and Chris Tucker

Directed by David O. Russell (The Fighter and Three Kings)

This is the Playbook for making great romantic comedies.

Life doesn’t always go according to plan…Pat Solatano (Bradley Cooper) has lost everything — his house, his job, and his wife. He now finds himself living back with his mother (Jacki Weaver) and father (Robert DeNiro) after spending eight months in a state institution on a plea bargain. Pat is determined to rebuild his life, remain positive and reunite with his wife, despite the challenging circumstances of their separation. All Pat’s parents want is for him to get back on his feet – and to share their family’s obsession with the Philadelphia Eagles football team. When Pat meets Tiffany (Jennifer Lawrence), a mysterious girl with problems of her own, things get complicated. Tiffany offers to help Pat reconnect with his wife, but only if he’ll do something very important for her in return. As their deal plays out, an unexpected bond begins to form between them, and silver linings appear in both of their lives.

Seemingly taking its cues from its central character – the bi-polar Bradley Cooper struggling to keep his emotions in check – David O. Russell’s latest feature swings back and forth between the highs to lows, which means laughs and tears.

While the film centers on two characters that are easily labeled “damaged goods,” Russell’s take on mental illness is fresh and charming. I loved how their insanity pulls them together, and Cooper and Lawrence both turn in impressive performances. As brilliant as they are, the richly developed secondary characters are just as good. While Pat and Tiffany are downing the anti-depressants, their friends and family members are gradually revealed to be just as broken.

There have been dozens if not hundreds of other movies about two damaged people who find each other, and quite a few that try to make us laugh at the painful struggle with mental illness. But Silver Linings Playbook never feels like a movie you’ve seen before, even if we all know where Pat and Tiffany will end up – especially if they don’t.

It may not be a typical Hollywood comedy, and that’s a good thing. Unfortunately with all the language and sexuality I just can’t go higher than a “Rental.”

SHOULD KIDS SEE IT?
There are two flashback scenes of Pat discovering Nikki was cheating on him. In the first, we see (from Pat’s point of view) clothes strewn about the floor of his house, including his wife’s panties. He then looks into the bathroom, and we see his wife in the shower, nude, her back to the camera. As Pat moves in closer, we see a man appear from beneath his wife’s waist, implying he was giving Nikki oral sex. In the second flashback, we see more of when Pat began beating the man, but we do briefly see his wife’s breast as she moves to stop him (a lot of the scene is blurred).??

Tiffany dances provocatively with Pat, in tight, cleavage and midriff revealing outfits. After one practice, Pat looks at Tiffany as she changes; we see her bare upper back. During one dance, Pat tries to lift Tiffany into the air, but the trick fails and her crotch rubs directly against his face for a few seconds (more comic than sexual). Dancers at a competition wear tight and extremely revealing outfits, one of them just barely covering a woman’s breasts.??

Tiffany admits that she used to be a “slut” after Tommy died, and says she had sex with 11 office employees, some of them women. She tells Pat details about how the women would have her do lap dances and “do things.” She says that when she is depressed, she turns to sex, and embraces her “dark side.” She and Patrick never do have sex during the film, though she asks him at one point. At the end of the movie, Pat and Tiffany passionately kiss, and are then seen cuddling and kissing in an armchair.

There is some violence. Like when Pat nearly beats his wife’s lover to death. Pat struggles with his anger and violent impulses throughout the film. He accidentally strikes his mother and gets into a fistfight with his dad.

There are nearly 75 f-words and 25 S-words hit the quarter-century mark. There are several other obscenities.

CONVERSATION STARTER>

1. What are some words you would use to describe Pat and Tiffany? (Try to get them to say “broken.”)


2. Have you ever been broken or brokenhearted? What does brokenness look like for you and/or your friends?


3. Read Psalm 34:18
   
   The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit.
   
   What does that tell us about God?


4. How can we be like Jesus and show compassion to the brokenhearted?