Beautiful Boy

Timothée Chalamet. It's a name that conjures up a pretentious shampoo ain't it. Or some type of stinking Gallic cheese. But no, it belongs to a young American actor with a superb career ahead of him if he can keep lashing out performances of this calibre. There's moments in here where, no bullshit, he'll remind you of James Dean in Rebel Without A Cause or a young Robert De Niro in any number of 70's classics. With this film I finally get the buzz about him. It's just a pity the rest of the film doesn't live up to his standard.

Nic and David are father and son. Their once close relationship has been torn asunder by Nic's use of crystal meth and his repeated lapses back into drug addiction. David's constant worrying and repeated rescues of his son are starting to put a strain on his marriage to Karen and after a while he starts to realise that there's only so much a father can do for his son. 

This was a pretty good film given a huge boost by the acting within. It's overlong and repetitive in places but a pair of excellent performances from Chalamet and Steve Carell as Nic and David will keep you glued to the screen long after the story's spell has worn off. Tales of drug addiction are something we've all seen onscreen a million times before and this one really doesn't add anything new to the mix apart a suggestion that David's acceptance of Nic's use of marijuana helped lead him down the path he's on. David's guilt about this means he can never turn away from his son and it's during these moments of despair and self doubt that Carell really shines. He's so well know for his comedy stuff that you'd forget how good of an actor he can be. I liked the fractured timeline of the film too, skipping back and forward as we see the happy go lucky 6 year old Nic turning into the moody teenage Nic before becoming the disaffected 18 year old Nic who turns to narcotics to dull his pain. His parent's divorce is to blame and it's upsetting watching this young child who loves Nirvana turning into Charles Bukowski's biggest fan. Because the second your teen starts reading that pretentious bore you know he's in trouble.

The film belongs to Chalamet. He's magnetic as a young man who's guts are being ripped out by the demons in his head. His Nic is a strongly independent young man who wants to grow up on his own terms but his addiction and it's aftermath has him running back to his father's arms far more regularly than he can stand. The effect this has on his psyche is traumatic and Chalamet sells his despair perfectly with one father/son confrontation in a diner being the scene you'll instantly remember when this film is brought up in future discussions. With another actor in the part Nic would come across as a snivelly and spoiled little prick but here you can't help but feel empathy towards him. He's so good that unfortunately it shows up the rest of the film.

Maura Tierney and Amy Ryan are totally wasted as his step mother and mother respectively. Ryan spends most of her time on the phone and Tierney wanders around for the vast majority of the film looking spaced out. This acting choice is probably to show the numbing effect the whole saga has had on her but it doesn't exactly make for gripping viewing. That said the film is based on the real life memoirs of both father and son (this is a true story btw, prime Oscar bait) so inevitably everyone else was going to get pushed to the wayside. Because of this sidelining of supporting characters the film does struggle at times to fill it's 2 hr running time and combined with the repeated scenes of relapse this means anyone with a low attention span will struggle. But that's the nature of the beast with addiction I suppose. As Nic's counsellor mentions at one stage, relapse is part of rehabilation, so it's kind of churlish for us to complain about it being portrayed realistically.

Go see this for a superb performance from Chalamet. I'll be genuinely surprised if he doesn't get an Oscar nod for it. It's the kind of role they love but he definitely puts his own stamp on it.