TJE 7/17 - Margaret (2011)

The story of the production of "Margaret" is easily as interesting as the film itself. Director Kenneth Lonergan wrestled with editing the film for years, and multiple delays sparked lawsuits and endless speculation. The final result is an ungainly film that really could use a few more passes in the editing bay. Running two-and-a-half hours, "Margaret" feels overlong, unfocused, and self-indulgent. However, it occasionally manages moments of real intensity and thoughtful insight.

Teenage Lisa (Anna Paquin) is a precocious, but irresponsible student, the kind of girl who will expend much more effort justifying why she cheated on a test than studying for one, and she's charismatic enough to get away with it. She lives with her mother Joan (J. Smith-Cameron), a busy, distracted actress, in Manhattan. Her father Karl, played by Lonergan, lives on the West Coast. One day Lisa witnesses, and may be the cause of a fatal bus accident. She distracts the driver, Maretti (Mark Ruffalo), causing him to run a light and strike a pedestrian, Monica (Allison Janney), who dies in the street while Lisa holds her. This has a profound effect on Lisa, who can't accept that it was just an accident. She seeks out Monica's best friend Emily (Jeannie Berlin), starts acting out in school, and loses her virginity on a whim to a classmate named Paul (Kieran Culkin).

"Margaret" is densely packed with minor characters, all revolving around Lisa. Matt Damon and Matthew Broderick play her math and literature teacher respectively. Jean Reno shows up for a few scenes as her mother's new boyfriend. They don't all neatly fit into the confines of the narrative. Surely we should see more of Mark Ruffalo's and Kieran Culkin's characters, considering the impact that they have on Lisa. Michael Ealy appears briefly as a lawyer friend of Emily's. He's introduced like he's about to become an important player, but disappears after a single scene. However, he makes the most of that scene and comes across as a full and complete character, and it's the same with the others as well. Everyone in "Margaret" has as sense of possibility about them, that we might find another, more interesting facet of the story there if only we had the time to linger a bit longer.

However, the film is built around Lisa, and the excellent performance of Anna Paquin. At times Lisa is sympathetic, and at times she is infuriating. After the accident she is frequently defensive and angry, hiding behind a mask of teenage sullenness and righteous indignation. When confronted, she cries persecution, but is never hesitant to land her own blows, particularly with her mother. Lisa may be articulate, but she lacks self-awareness and perspective. At the same time she clearly feels so keenly, it's easy to empathize with her, even as she uses her emotions as an excuse to feed her own ego. She talks and talks and talks, making her the ideal protagonist for a film that is largely built around conversations. Paquin grabs the spotlight and never gives it up.

It took a while to get used to Lonergan's dialogue, which is wordy and literate. I wasn't a fan of the more confrontational moments, where characters erupt at each other in torrents of precisely scripted back-and-forth that doesn't sound genuine to the ear. Who has such perfect sentence construction when they're busy biting someone's head off? However, I like his pauses, the way that he often insinuates thoughts and moods into the silent moments. A nice little throwaway scene occurs late in the film, when Matthew Broderick's teacher character passes Lisa and a friend in the park. They lob a few taunts at him, which he seems to ignore, but a quick shot of the back of his head emphasizes that he's taken in every word. Also, though scenes go on for unusually long stretches, Lonergan knows where to cut, and where to wait just a beat longer, to catch a reaction or allow someone's discomfort to sink it.

His film is great scene by scene, but the whole of "Margaret" never really coheres as it should. Smaller characters are left by the wayside too often. Some plot threads are sorely underdeveloped while others are dragged out endlessly. The final scene doesn't resonate as it should, because we never got quite enough time with one of the characters who is key to the ending. Also, the political and cultural references seem rather awkwardly shoehorned in. The post 9/11 parallels are pretty damn obvious without Lisa's contentious debates with a Syrian classmate, thanks. And the opera and literature references are awfully on-the-nose.

I've seen other critics hail "Margaret" as a great film, as one of the best American films of this era. I can't agree, because the flaws simply go too deep. I can see the greatness there, but it's not realized well enough to fulfill that potential. It is a very good film, though, and a noble attempt at being something more meaningful, more thoughtful, and more honest than most coming-of-age movies. And in the end it was well worth all the drama and effort of its creation.
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