For those who saw Noah Baumbach’s debut feature, Kicking and Screaming, during its brief theatrical run in 1995, Mr. Jealousy may have seemed a disappointment—though less so than his botched sophomore feature Highball, mercifully unreleased for years. In some ways, Mr. Jealousy is the more commercial film: it’s less allusive; the humor isn’t as biting; it can roughly be classed into a genre (Romantic Comedy) while the subject matter of Kicking and Screaming feels more personal; plus, Eric Stoltz, who was foisted upon Baumbach’s first film in an effort to increase marketability, now plays the lead. (The two actually hit it off while creating the character of Chet.) But coming at it from another angle, Mr. Jealousy is a much tighter and less languorous film, and though Baumbach is somewhat boxed-in making a film intended for a wider audience, his style is surprisingly inventive and energetic. He packs the film with throwaway gags and little diversions reminiscent of Francois Truffaut’s loopy noir Shoot the Piano Player.
As Baumbach’s future-collaborator Wes Anderson does in his 2001 masterpiece, The Royal Tenenbaums, Baumbach uses punchy, hyper-literary, third-person narration—which he provides himself—to quickly dispense exposition and guide the editing of some quick montages. Even when the narration simply spells out a character’s inner thoughts, it does so in a witty, self-aware way. Stoltz plays substitute teacher and aspiring novelist Lester Grimm, whose past romantic experience has reduced him to a state of constant, neurotic jealousy and distrust. In an early scene between him and new paramour Ramona (Annabella Sciorra), the latter’s dialogue becomes inaudible as the narrator catalogues the thoughts running through Lester’s head. We see her gesturing as she relates her story, as well as Lester’s reactions, and once she’s finished and the narration ceases, Lester simply responds, “That’s great,” as if he’d had the same third-person narration running through his head at the same time.
The film is full of great little moments like that—perfectly timed set-ups, punchlines and a number of non-sequiturs, such as “Can I have your pickle?” One can argue that the film doesn’t amount to much—the plot is ridiculous, the romantic leads a bit bland—but it’s just so enjoyable on a moment-to-moment basis that it would be churlish to hold its shortcomings against it. It also feels like an artifact from a time (or, perhaps, a transmission from an alternate universe) when Stoltz and Sciorra (a cut-rate Marisa Tomei) were bankable stars. Although it lacks the now-dated hipness of, say, Reality Bites, the film is very much a product of the ‘90s, which adds to its overall appeal.
Perhaps the film’s most significant achievement, the one that should confirm its place in some sort of canon, is this: it features Chris Eigeman in his finest role (okay, tied with Fred in Whit Stillman’s Barcelona). Here, he plays a pricklier, bearded version of his usual smart-ass character. Dashiell Frank, a successful young author and Lester’s chief romantic rival, becomes the subject of Lester’s obsession after he finds out about Dashiell’s history with Ramona. Lester, posing as his friend Vince (the great Carlos Jacott), joins Dashiell’s therapy group to investigate. Vince, by the way, encourages all his friends to enter therapy, and is mystified that anyone wouldn’t take this as a compliment. (“I see your craziness, and it can be helped,” he explains). Lester and Dashiell’s back-and-forth during group sessions provide some of the film’s funniest bits (Lester ends one out-of-context riposte with, “And I think Coke does vary by can!”) But Dashiell—initially an antagonist—reveals surprising depth as he and Lester get to know each other. He’s pretentious and he takes himself too seriously, but having Lester around to call him on his bullshit keeps him honest, and leads him to grow in ways that actually feel believable.
Despite surface appearances, Mr. Jealousy is no less distinctive than any of Baumbach’s other work. It’s certainly the outlier in his career, but it’s by no means a film to be dismissed. And as far as this writer is concerned, it surpasses his first effort, in which Baumbach tries too hard to create the kind of clever dialogue that seems so effortless in the films of Whit Stillman, a clear influence. Mr. Jealousy can’t reasonably be called brilliant, but it’s certainly charming. Sometimes that’s enough.