Get Well Soon

I'm a Vincent Gallo nut. I love the guy and would even watch a movie of him reciting the phone book. That would probably be more entertaining than sitting through 'Get Well Soon'. Apparently this is a comedy. Coulda fooled me. The only laugh I got out of it was the sheer audacity of the video cover blurb which said it was "in the tradition of 'There's Something About Mary'. Say what?! '..Mary' was actually funny, 'Get Well Soon' isn't. And apart from that the similarity is? You tell me!

Vincent Gallo ('Buffalo 66', 'Palookaville') plays Bobby Bishop, a hip talk show host. He appears to be cracking up. He leaves his show in disgrace to return to New York and look up his old girlfriend (Courtney Cox) and attempts to woo her back. Mixed up with this are various, I hesitate to even call them sub-plots, involving mental patients and Matthew Broderick's dog. It's too stupid and pointless to even bother elaborating. Gallo radiates charisma, and is always watchable, even when the material is as poor and as dull as this. And boy! is it poor and dull.

The supporting cast includes Jeffrey Tambor (best known for 'The Larry Sanders Show', and who, funnily enough, was actually in 'There's Something About Mary'), Anne Meara (veteran character actor/comedienne, and mother to Ben Stiller), and Elina Lowensohn ('Schindler's List' and various Hal Hartley movies).

This is easily the worst movie Vincent Gallo has been involved with. It's even worse than 'Arizona Dream' which at least had a handful of outstanding scenes involving Gallo to redeem it. 'Get Well Soon' is a tedious bore from start to finish. I honestly can't think of one good thing about it. The fact is it's an awful movie that will please nobody. Let's just pretend it never happened...

I was going to criticize the movie for expecting me to believe that the nasal, twangy Vincent Gallo could ever be a real world talk show star, but then I remembered Conan O'Brien. So I'll criticize this movie for all of it's other unfortunate glaring shortcomings. Firstly, it's way too in love with itself, constantly pausing for us to admire it's daring brilliance and hip, snarky outrageousness. Some people might find it edgy but it's actually a rather staid, unremarkable, conventional study of celebrity life and all the attendant madness. It's more than common knowledge that many, if not most, talented performers are also afflicted with various forms of mental illness. Depression, bi-polar disorder,and even schizophrenia are frequently driving creative stars to exceptional extremes. So this analysis of the successful talk show host Bobby Bishop is redundant. Just witnessing a talk show star's actual performance is in fact a clinical analysis of their pathology. Dave Letterman, for instance, nightly exposes his damaged, twisted psyche to the nation. We are entertained by his otherwise socially aberrant behavior. If, however, we daily had to encounter such a bitter, cantankerous conflicted personality we would most likely move to another state. There's so many stories, many told by Dave himself, of just how antisocial he actually is. But he's managed to direct his neurosis into an entertaining and lucrative direction. And what about Johnny Carson or Jack Parr who we now know were sufferers of bouts of extreme depression? And Regis Philbin? He has admitted the same.

So exposing mental illness in the entertainment industry is old news, no longer a headline. Nor was it in 2001 when this film was released, but we're expected to be shocked and confused and fascinated by our hero's condition. It's a mildly interesting personal fact, nothing more, if you're judging by society's enthusiastic consumption of the latest varieties of mood elevating medications; we ARE the Prozac nation.

Anyway, Gallo has been in a few very interesting, off beat, challenging, controversial films, normally portraying quirky, troubled somewhat threatening but charismatic types. He's trying it again here, but that personality profile just doesn't work for this role. He comes off so self conscious and distracted that it's impossible to believe he was ever anything but repulsively narcissistic. A true talk show star is able to at least present a credible appearance of interest for others. Even the preposterous Larry King had an uncanny ability to stare his guests straight in the eye while his mind drifted to thoughts of what he'll order at Katz's deli later that evening. Actually, later that afternoon, you know, while they're still offering the early bird special.

So the love story is interesting, many of the conversations are entertainingly witty and clever, and a few of the situations are comical and original. But the timing is too often way off - stilted, rushed, erratic or rambling - probably because much of it seems improvised. And badly edited. Or rather, overly obviously edited, calling attention to its precious, wacky insouciance. I have never before used that word, insouciance, in writing, but this film demanded it of me. That should tell you just how frustrated I am with this well intentioned, but ultimately fatally flawed bit of stylized indulgence.

I must admit that I was captivated by Vincent Gallo's performance in "Buffalo '66" and that is the only reason that I was drawn to "Get Well Soon" when I saw it on the video rental shelf. So maybe I wanted to like this film more that others.

Regardless, I feel that "Get Well Soon" succeeded in many areas. The plot was a blend of dark comedy and soul-searching, much like "Buffalo '66" and Gallo gave almost as good a performance as the desperate, haunted protagonist. Courtney Cox delivers a solid performance as his old flame whom he's seeking to reunite with in hopes of getting a hold on his life again. Thrown into the mix are the mental illness of her mother and brother and latent homosexuality of her live-in boyfriend. Always troubled by the constant exposure to Gallo's "Bobby Bishop" character who's now a late night talk show host, Cox's character "Lily" cannot find solace in a world of overwhelming emotions.

This film is a success, despite the fact that it's not entirely original. However, the plot lines are intriguing and the characters are just short of mesmerizing. The story is told in a reverse pyramid fashion where the viewer has to deduce exactly what the relationship between the characters are.

This is by no means an outstanding film... but as far as Vincent Gallo movies go... I don't feel at all disappointed.

Rating: 7/10

Mr Vincent Gallo is an absorbing, eye-catching beast. Whilst immediately drawn to his fractured features, it is his concentrated screen presence that you hold in mind. Here he plays Kevin, in the guise of the Bobby Bishop, a late-night talk-show host. Becoming increasingly aware of his frustrating emptiness, he starts to twist free of the ever-pandering agents, artists and parasites that accompany his fame. His thoughts turn to an abandoned love (Courteney Cox), and returning home for a reconciliation, encounters involving and amusing obstacles such as thieves, hookers, imitators, mental patients and the police. This is clearly Vincent's film, from the music to the awakened speech to camera near the end, however Courteney Cox performs admirably and the scenes with her mother are played well. The rest of the cast fill their scenes with delirious energy, although the wonderful talents and Romanian beauty of Elina Lowensohn were not rewarded with enough screen time. Director Justin McCarthy's direction is crisp. He develops the story well, and has framed New York nicely. Keep an eye out for 'Jump', an earlier piece of work.

Love Gallo, that's gotta be stated up front, that's why I wanted to see this film in the first place. He's great in it, of course, as 'empty' talk show host Bobby Bishop, searching the streets of New York City for his lost true love, Lily (Courtney Cox). There's a lot of other stuff going on as well (a LOT of stuff) - crazy people trying to steal Matthew Broderick's dog (to get closer to Sarah Jessica Parker), Lily's mother (the great Anne Meara), who is - get this - practicing to be a homeless person (just in case), gay boyfriends, insane friends, lying hookers, Bobby's beyond-brown-nosing manager (the fabulous Jeffrey Tambor, who played basically the same role on Gary Shandling's show). I think this is the main reason the movie is just not very satisfying -- there's simply too #$@kin' much going on, for $@#(*&ts sake.

If some of these characters had been left out (like most of them), and we had gotten to focus more on Bobby and his self-destructive-but-trying-oh-so-hard-to-make-it-work character, Get Well Soon would have been a far better movie. Gallo, with all his good/bad-and-everything-inbetween contradictions gloriously blazing in full form, could have easily carried the day.