A film review by Sara Stewart for NYPost.com on Dec. 19, 2018 (edited by the blogger).
Steve Carell tugs at the heart, but Welcome to Marwen is tiresome
In 2000, a man named Mark Hogancamp was brutally assaulted by five men outside a bar in Kingston, New York. The attack, a hate crime motivated by Hogancamp’s mentioning that he liked to wear nylons and high-heeled shoes because it connected him with the female gender, left him comatose and then an amnesiac. A 2010 documentary, Marwencol, showed his unique method of coping with his post-traumatic stress disorder: Hogancamp constructed a 1/6th scale (also known as Playscale, Fashion Doll or Barbie scale) World War II Belgian village that he named Marwencol, in which he photographed tableaux of its doll inhabitants - male Allied soldiers and heroic Belgian women - and the five sadistic German SS troops who periodically invaded the village and attacked Cap’n Hogie, Hogancamp’s 1/6th scale alter ego.
The Marwencol documentary is a great watch (you can find it on YouTube).
I cannot say the same for Welcome to Marwen, Robert Zemeckis’ gimmicky adaptation. Despite a sympathetic lead performance from Steve Carell, the fictionalized version bogs down in extensive animated doll sequences, so similar that they grow increasingly tiresome. Zemeckis’ Barbie-sized squad is initially impressive; each is modeled on a real woman in Mark’s life, including his Russian home nurse Anna (Gwendoline Christie), his physical therapist GI Julie (Janelle Monáe) and his kindly new neighbor across-the-street Nicol (Leslie Mann). The fictional town’s original name, Marwen, is a combination of Mark and Wendy (Stefanie von Pfetten), Mark’s former partner, and the town’s final name, Marwencol, adds the last syllable of Nicol, with whom Mark had become infatuated.
But the screenplay, by Zemeckis and Caroline Thompson (City of Ember), is gratingly obvious, with poor Carell reduced to periodically shouting out dialogue like I’m tired of being lonely! and dropping to the floor in melodramatic fits of PTSD-induced hallucination. He wrestles with a pill dependence, the resolution of which is just as unbelievable. Deja Thoris (Diane Kruger) the doll personification of his PTSD and drug addiction whispers in his ear: I’m the only one who can take your pain away. Tonally, the screenplay is all over the place: When Mark brought his jeep full of armed Barbie dolls to his attackers’ court sentencing, people in my audience laughed, although the moment seemed intended as pathos.
Despite the film’s professed reverence for women and their footwear - some of its most touching moments involve Mark and his plastic doll alter ego, Cap’n Hogie, donning pumps - Marwen never bothers to bring depth to any of its female characters. Leslie Mann’s Nicol has few defining features beyond looking gently puzzled and collecting old teapots.
Zemeckis, caught up in the razzle-dazzle of CGI, can’t resist giving his older work a shout-out: in one animated sequence with Deja Thoris’ time machine, the vehicle leaves flaming Back to the Future tire tracks. Mostly, it’s just a depressing reminder that Robert Zemeckis’ heyday (31 directing credits including Romancing the Stone, Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Back to the Future, Forrest Gump, Contact, Cast Away) may be, as the license plate on the DeLorean in Back to the Future read, OUTATIME. [Stewart’s rating: 2 out of 4 stars]
Blogger’s comment: While the film’s violence may be necessary, it quickly becomes gratuitous, with Cap’n Hogie’s five doll-sized German SS troop assailants beating and torturing him again and again in dark, red-tinged settings. At some point you may want to use the remote control MUTE button and avert your eyes. It's not clear that Hogancamp's doll-sized fantasy therapy can be widely applied in PTSD situations, so the main take-away from this film might be that situational awareness is important. If you find yourself in a bar in East Deliverance, New York, stay sober and do not reveal your interest in cross-dressing to any of the bar's denizens.
Labels: biography, comedy, drama, fantasy, romance
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