In 2014, an increasingly popular, increasingly confident little streaming service by the name of Netflix flexed its muscles and its moneybags with a curious punt for a business synonymous with modern, 21st-Century media: it greenlit a comedy series starring two septuagenarian actresses in yet another reboot of the old Odd Couple trope. Starring Lily Tomlin, whose recent years had seen her wasted in small parts in dud productions, and Jane Fonda, whose grand return to the big screen was spent on such less-than-grand titles as Georgia Rule (2007) and Peace, Love & Misunderstanding (2011), it seems quaint to think it now but this was far from a surefire hit for the streamer and could have only accelerated its two brilliant stars’ slightly ignominious decline were it to flop.
The best of a decade later, Grace and Frankie has become one of Netflix’s tentpole comedy productions and a veritable jewel in the crowns of both Fonda and Tomlin. But now, after its seventh and final season, apparently it’s time to move on. Or so the duo’s new movie, Moving On, would quite literally suggest. After so long working together, their first shared big-screen title appears to promise many of the show’s familiar quirky charm alongside its wry but earnest streak of female bonding in tough times, only now the times are tougher. Claire (Fonda) reunites with old friend Evelyn (Tomlin) at the funeral of a fellow old friend, where she confides her plan, decades in the making, to murder their friend’s widower, guilty of committing an egregious wrong against her many years before.
Is it suitable to expend a solid paragraph-and-a-half on a TV show in a review of an entirely unconnected movie? Normally, perhaps not but, in this case, the shadow of Grace and Frankie looms so large over Moving On that it’s hard not to see it in its every frame. Once again, Fonda inhabits the straight-man part, the serious, uptight flipside to, once again, Tomlin’s cheeky free spirit. Once again, their ostensible incompatibility as friends or, indeed, accomplices provides the basis for the majority of the gags. And, once again, they navigate a plot surrounding botched amateur criminal enterprises, ex-partners and the complications of entering one’s golden years. The tone of Paul Weitz’s script and the style of his directing is a mere stone’s throw away from those of Grace and Frankie, much as the movie’s non-specific Southern California setting seems a mere few minutes up the road from the show’s La Jolla setting.
So it doesn’t exactly score many points for originality. But, if it ain’t broke, eh? As a kind of alternate universe spin-off, Moving On certainly isn’t bad. But it’s fairer to evaluate the movie on its own terms, even if those terms do feel dictated by seven seasons of a well-known, highly successful streaming show whose many fans will likely comprise the majority of its audience. And, on those terms, again it certainly isn’t bad. Tomlin plays Evelyn like an Ambien-addled Frankie and, to her credit, it works — she’s a titan of comic timing, also displaying her capabilities as a dramatic performer here in subtle, unforced character development. Fonda is also excellent and particularly strong in scenes where she’s forced to reckon with her character’s vulnerability — she’s a woman nursing wounds that have plagued her for most of her life and her extreme methods of treating them only seem to be making them worse. One is reminded of Fonda’s versatility as a performer in these moments; one may wish to see this great star exhibit more of that versatility in future projects — surely she’s reached her fill of tightly-wound mothers, wives, grandmothers, mothers-in-law etc.
Left to their own devices, these two could turn any turkey of a script into a triumph. But here, they’re left to Weitz’s devices, which aren’t quite up to par. The movie rather lumbers along, speeding ahead when you feel it ought to linger longer, then slowing to a halt when you feel it should pick up the pace. Weitz burdens the wrong moments with the right dialogue, or vice versa, and seems perpetually unsure as to the tone and tempo at which he ought to proceed. The whole movie is thus lost in a kind of tonal and rhythmic limbo, such that, when it reaches its closing scene, it almost catches you off guard — surely that’s not it? Isn’t there another 20 or 30 minutes to go?
And so Moving On’s titular claim comes off, in the end, more like a taunt than a promise. The movie itself doesn’t move much at all, not least when you consider its climactic deus ex machina. The leads? It’s hard to see this as “moving on” from the roles that have consumed the past nine years of their careers — the parts are too similar, the circumstances too familiar, the style of project too unadventurous. It’s always a pleasure to spend 90-odd minutes in the company of either of these wonderful performers, doubly so when they’re side by side. But they’re capable of moving on much further themselves, flexing their own dramatic muscles a little and showing us what two now-octogenarian actresses of their caliber can do.
Photo courtesy of Roadside Attractions
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