Movie Review: Love & Mercy

Wouldn’t it be nice if biographical movies about famous rock stars, musicians and artists weren’t so predictable?

Regardless of the fact that every biopic is based on real events from the lives of the eccentric and often public subject, the collection and presentation of the important, transformative moments  have reached a point of being formulaic and cliché. The musical odyssey has become kitsch.

From “Ray” (Ray Charles) to “Walk the Line” (Johnny Cash), “Get on Up” (James Brown), “Notorious” (Notorious B.I.G.) and a litany of others, these film's histories are strung together by moments so often seen that one could list the ingredients to become a musical genius.

There’s the tortured childhood (usually caused by an absent or abusive parent); the teenage discovery of their unnatural talent; the early success; the tumultuous romance; the drug and substance abuse years; and always nods to the super-fans in the know, who have come to see the life of their favorite artist played out on the big screen.

These general history surveys are great for high school pop music history classes, but they hardly reach the heights in cinema that their respective subjects reached during their music careers.

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The rock star biopic has become such a common language that it was parodied to wonderful effect in Jake Kasdan’s underrated 2007 film, “Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story,” starring John C. Reilly as a legendary rocker reflecting on his life story.

However, there are a few movies that rise to the challenge and break from the general history mold to emulate and capture the brilliance of their musical subject in the vernacular of film.

And the writers and directors of these movies also have the sense to throw away the notion of capturing every important moment in a multifaceted and multitalented person’s life and instead dig deep into one particular portion. This digging beneath the layers of key moments is when the music of biography rings true.

Films like “Thirty Two Short Films About Glenn Gould,” (Glenn Gould), “Amadeus” (W.F. Mozart), “Sid & Nancy” (Sid Vicious and Nancy Spungen) and “I’m Not There” (Bob Dylan) experiment with style and form to deliver a truer sense of a musician's identity than the standard linear and chronological film fare.

“Love & Mercy,” a new biopic on the life and music of influential Beach Boys founder Brian Wilson, is the most recent addition to the latter, higher class of films. Presented this week at the Sarasota Film Festival, the movie is an interplay between two instrumental moments in Wilson’s life. The first is his production of the groundbreaking album “Pet Sounds” in the summer of 1965.

A milestone in popular recording techniques and arrangement, the album changed how rock and roll artists recorded and looked at their music. Before “Pet Sounds,” rock was viewed as pop and insignificant fare for teenagers. But after its release, musicians, critics and culture began to view rock and roll as a credible art form and shifted the public to view an album as one unit of expression, each song playing and responding with the others to create a complete aural and emotional experience.

The second important moment is the period in the 1980s and early ’90s when Wilson, suffering from a failed marriage, substance abuse and a crippling mental state (often hearing voices in his head), was under the control of Dr. Eugene Landy, a radical psychotherapist who was originally hired by Wilson’s family and first wife to aid his deteriorating behavior and mental state.

By focusing on these two moments in Wilson’s life, director Bill Pohlad is able to illuminate not only Wilson’s brilliant music but also the sonic under trappings and genius of his tortured mind and gentle soul. The film doesn’t get lost in history. It lives every note in the bliss of Wilson’s troubles and splendors.

The film is an impressive feat from Pohlad who has only directed a feature film once before, all the way back in 1990. He's spent the 25 years in between becoming an accomplished producer and has helped create some of the most memorable films in the last few years including “A Prairie Home Companion,” “Food, Inc.,” “The Runaways,” “Into the Wild,” “The Tree of Life,” “12 Years a Slave” and “Wild.”

Using a touching and emotionally probing script by Michael A. Lerner and Oren Moverman (director of “The Messanger,” “Rampart” and “Time Out of Mind”), Pohlad uses his camera lens as a reflection of Wilson’s considerable musical genius.

When Wilson is in the studio or at the piano creating new and innovative songs, the camera is mobile and affectionate. It moves with the gentle grace indicative of Wilson’s demeanor and bright, layered compositions. Inversely, when Wilson is in the throes of depression, hearing voices and under the invasive palm of Landy, the camera is static and motionless. It’s as if the symphony in Wilson’s head has stopped, and the camera followed in suit.

Sound really is the star of this film, and rightly so. Wilson pioneered the art of audio engineering and recording in the rock form by using any and everything as an instrument. From obscure and exotic instruments to dogs, whistles and everything in between, Wilson inserted everything as an instrument in “Pet Sounds.” And in “Love & Mercy,” Pohlad and his music and sound department accentuate everything from silverware, footsteps and hairpins to Wilson’s pocket pop symphonies as characters in themselves. Considering Wilson’s hearing was supernatural (a miracle considering he’s 95% deaf in his right ear), treating every musical and non-musical sound with as much importance as Wilson did automatically elevates this biopic above the usual fare.

The performances are remarkably tender and devastating. Paul Dano plays Wilson during the ’60s, and John Cusack plays Wilson during his mental imprisonment to Dr. Landy (played with vicious manipulation by Paul Giamatti). Sharing a character effectively is no easy task, and Dano and Cusack’s respective portrayals speak to each other as beautifully as Wilson’s cherished Beach Boys harmonies. Dano is the indie wunderkind of the moment, and “Love & Mercy” is another addition to a list of impressive portrayals as leading or character roles in “There Will Be Blood,” “Little Miss Sunshine,” “Meek’s Cutoff,” “Being Flynn,” “Ruby Sparks,” “Prisoners” and “12 Years a Slave.”

The more surprising turn is by Cusack. After thriving in the late ’80s and most of the 90s from his breakthrough role in “Say Anything…,” the 2000s have been a string of some under appreciated and mostly also-rans. Cusack hopped from genre film to genre film, from action, to horror/thriller, romantic comedy and gross-out comedy.

But with “Love & Mercy” Cusack is given the material and the space he needs to not only portray a larger-than-life talent, but also to allow the soul, tenderness and humor he brings to his best performances shine through. Not once does Cusack descend into maudlin or physical ticks that plague the worst performances of mentally ill characters. Cusack brings the tortured Brian Wilson to life. He embodies the thematic paradox of any great Brian Wilson song: a gentle and whimsical exterior built on the melancholy and blissful sorrow of everyday life.

There are two scenes that define this splendidly refreshing and moving biopic. First is a young Brian Wilson venturing into the studio he'll use to record “Pet Sounds.” It’s a warm silence. Almost like a womb or a cocoon, the silence is Wilson’s canvas on which he will create that sensational album. And after two decades of disillusion and disintegration, Wilson meets his eventual savior from Dr. Landy, Cadillac salesman Melinda Ledbetter (played by perpetual acting MVP Elizabeth Banks).

Their first date is to the Griffith Observatory. Cusack as the elder and troubled Wilson looks up at the stars in the planetarium, pointing out the constellations to an enraptured Ledbetter. To Ledbetter and to countless millions, Wilson has been our sonic guide, connecting the constellation of our ears to our hearts with each song. It’s fantastic and fitting that Wilson has received a film worthy of his introspective heart and rapturous music.