MARVIN'S ROOM
A film review by Scott Renshaw
Copyright 1997 Scott Renshaw
(Miramax) Starring: Meryl Streep, Leonardo DiCaprio, Diane Keaton, Robert DeNiro, Hume Cronyn, Gwen Verdon, Hal Scardino. Screenplay: Scott McPherson, based on his play. Producers: Scott Rudin, Jane Rosenthal, Robert DeNiro. Director: Jerry Zaks. MPAA Rating: PG-13 (some strong profanity, mature themes). Running Time: 97 minutes. Reviewed by Scott Renshaw.
Please ignore the next couple of sentences if you are a stickler about having no part of a plot spoiled for you: in MARVIN'S ROOM, nobody dies. Illness plays a significant role in the story, and many viewers have come to resent maudlin disease-of-the-week melodramas in which everything seems to function as an extended prologue to a tear-jerking deathbed scene. There is something terribly dehumanizing about making an illness the central character in a narrative, so it is a relief to discover that MARVIN'S ROOM is actually about people. Though occasionally stage-bound and over-plotted, MARVIN'S ROOM finds superb actors lending a surprisingly restrained touch to a genre crying out for a little restraint.
Diane Keaton plays Bessie Wakefield, a never-married woman who has spent most of her adult life caring for her bed-ridden father Marvin (Hume Cronyn) and somewhat simple-minded Aunt Ruth (Gwen Verdon) in Florida. After years of helping others, however, Bessie suddenly finds herself in need of help when she is diagnosed with leukemia. With a bone marrow donation her best chance at survival, Bessie calls on the only other immediate family she has: Lee (Meryl Streep), the sister she has not seen in nearly twenty years. Though miles and profound differences have separated them, Lee comes to Bessie with her two sons -- emotionally troubled Hank (Leonardo DiCaprio) and bookish Charlie (Hal Scardino). The reunion is strained by a variety of conflicts, but gradually the family members begin to realize the strength of the bonds that connect them, and their need for each other.
Writer Scott McPherson died of AIDS in 1992, and if you look carefully at MARVIN'S ROOM you can see evidence of that specific disease in many aspects of the story: the personal relationships between the ill and their care-takers; the care-takers themselves becoming ill; the tension of familial disapproval. Fortunately, MARVIN'S ROOM isn't _about_ AIDS any more than it is _about_ any disease. It is about estrangement and reconciliation and family ties, and it covers this treacherous ground with as much comedy as sadness. There are some wonderful black-humored moments, including Aunt Ruth's pain-blocking device which also acts as a garage door opener and an absent-minded doctor (Robert DeNiro) who uses tourniquets as pants clips while riding his bicycle. Stage veteran Jerry Zaks does fine work with his rookie screen effort, and the gifted cinematographer Piotr Sobocinski (Krzysztof Kieslowski's RED) gives MARVIN'S ROOM a warm, comforting glow. The overall effect of the film is an unusual one for films of its kind: it draws you in without pouncing on you with over-wrought emotions.
The superb cast certainly deserves much of the credit for that success. Diane Keaton, who has been re-born with two great screen showcases in 1996 (this one and THE FIRST WIVES CLUB), radiates a basic decency as Bessie, but she is not painted in saintly tones. Bessie is not bitter at the hand life has dealt her; she is simply resentful that Lee left her to play it alone. She has a couple of fine moments with Leonardo DiCaprio, who plays a stock "troubled youth" role skillfully and without histrionics, as the two lonely souls find sympathy in one another. And of course there is Meryl Streep, an actress so talented it has become a sort of cinematic sport to mock her versatility. Here she plays Lee with an anger which drives her every action (though she does indulge in that well-work actor's crutch of acting with her cigarette on occasion), and she is convincing both in her early resistance to any overtures of good will and in her slow realization that she cares more about her sister than she realized. There is a particular grace to her honest portrayal of someone terribly uncomfortable with being around illness. In one perfectly pitched scene, she recoils at the sheer number of emergency numbers needed to care for her father, then slowly steels herself to helping with his medication because she knows at that moment that she is needed. The conflict between Bessie and Lee is presented with an ironic realization that each sister thinks the other one has gotten the better life, and both Keaton and Streep make the tearing down of that wall a moving experience.
There are certainly times when MARVIN'S ROOM feels hemmed in by its stage roots, and conversations build to an over-dramatized pitch. McPherson's script also over plays its comic relief card, particularly in the person of Dan Hedaya as a lithium-medicated receptionist who seems more appropriate to an episode of "Murphy Brown." DiCaprio's character also feels out of place occasionally, as though every time the story turned back to him it was in danger of losing its way. The relationship between the two sisters is the heart of MARVIN'S ROOM, and the other conflicts and relationships feel intrusive; the focus on DiCaprio makes you wonder why the character of the other brother (Hal Scardino, who spends nearly the entire film reading "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea") was included at all. But the important factor in MARVIN'S ROOM is that these people don't get together for the express purpose of watching one of them die. Living is more interesting -- and more complicated -- than dying, and McPherson created a work which recognizes that fact. You don't have to have a funeral to touch real emotions.
On the Renshaw scale of 0 to 10 room services: 7.
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