What Maisie Knew (2012)

A truly remarkable movie, filled with great acting, masterful editing and filming, and terrific writing. The basis of it all is the core here, a glimmering Henry James novel by the same title from over 100 years earlier. It's amazing how well the story holds up set in contemporary times, and changed in many necessary (and interesting) ways. What it keeps it going is the basic heartbreaking drama of a child tossed between two indifferent parents.

The mother might be seen as the main actor here, Julianne Moore, and this is the best I've ever seen her, I think. She gives a slightly fiery performance, and "slightly" is perfect, avoiding an overacting job suggested by her role as a slightly successful rock and roll star. She's terrifically awful and you come to hate her, appropriately.

The father (Steve Coogan) also puts in a sharp performance playing the lively, fun parent who is a selfish womanizer, hiding, sometimes, his flaws from his daughter. His relationship with the mother is not detailed very far because it is mostly one of distance and disdain. And mutual abuse.

The real star here is the girl, an utterly charming and beautifully effective actress, Onata, Aprile. She succeeds not by her delivery of great lines, but by her expressions. It's all because Henry James understood something delicate about children in these situations: they know what's going on and don't say it. And they also don't let it affect them because they simply can't afford to, or because they become hardened in some little ways, making them withdraw or act out. That Maisie maintains a delicious sweetness without playing the victim is quite remarkable, and Aprile is brilliant.

The secondary woman and man in the story are also terrific, and their roles grow as the movie grows. In fact, they become the sympathetic heart of things.

Pulling this together is the directing pair, McGehee and Siegel. This is their fifth movie together, and neither man has directed anything without the other. I've not seen any of the other four, but the reviews are middling to poor for all of them, so I'm not sure how far the novelty takes us. But it works here perfectly, making the complexity unfold quickly and coherently.

It's an ordinary drama on the surface, but let this one sink in over time. It's that good.

Maisie (Onata Aprile) is a six year old who is trying to exist as her family disintegrates. Her mother Susanna (Julianne Moore) is a rock star angry at her art dealing husband Beale (Steve Coogan). The divorce is a bitter affair. Eventually Beale marries the nanny Margo (Joanna Vanderham),and Susanna marries bartender Lincoln (Alexander Skarsgård). Neither parent is really fit to raise Maisie.

This is a modern day reinterpretation of the Henry James novel. The audience is invited to experience the divorce through the eyes of the child. It is heartbreaking when the mother tries to couch the child in her divorce interview. However there isn't enough of those moments. There is a much more naturalistic flow. It is very subtle. It's maybe too subtle. The inherit drama isn't pushed out to the front. The child is an isolated passive figure floating from one caretaker to the next. It's a tale often told since it was first published in 1897.

It's not only Maisie who knows where this is going. It's the viewer too. It will be hard not to see where this is going. That doesn't mean it's a bad thing though. While we can see where this is going (from Maisies point of view),the actors make it worth our while, which is a feat if you think there are only 4 people carrying this on their shoulders (if you count Maisie out).

The acting and the decent pace the story moves makes this a very enjoyable if very predictable story. Something everyone can watch, if they like a drama or two. So while this wasn't the best movie I watched that year it's still one of the better ones