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Watching the new romantic drama Carousel (premiering today at the Sundance Film Festival) slowly unfold, I kept thinking this is the kind of love story for adults that Hollywood used to make with abandon but now feels like an endangered species.
It is clearly a personal film for Rachel Lambert (The Radiant City, Sometimes I Think About Dying), a writer-director who returns to her roots in a Cleveland suburb — her high school, her old haunts, peppered with family and friends — for a story about love lost, love found again, plus the cost of both with the baggage from the past, the tentativeness of the present and the questions of a future.
Where she got lucky was in her casting with Chris Pine, a fine actor not often given the chance to play this kind of reflective adult role. Here he is Noah, a divorced doctor and father whose daughter Maya (Abby Ryder Fortson) and her debating ambitions take center stage at the same time as Maya’s debate coach, Rebecca (Jenny Slate), comes back as a past love who got away. Rebecca’s reappearance upends Noah’s settled life, one he isn’t looking to shake up at this point, but it is clear she becomes a magnet for unfinished emotion.
At first it is not clear why Rebecca is back in the town where they spent much of their youth. Eventually we learn she up and left to follow her own career dreams to Washington D.C.; in her wake she left what was clearly the love of her life, but in denial of that she chose another path. She hadn’t forgotten Noah, certainly still had the kind of spark most people think can’t be renewed, but the questions remain. If they were in love why did she leave? And for her, the knowledge that he got married, had a daughter and moved on with his life in that town was closing a chapter. The only problem now is it wasn’t really closed, even if they are both riding on their own carousels, afraid to get off and get hurt — again.
The bulk of Lambert’s lovely if brooding romance is the pair’s reconnection, the complication of Rebecca also being Maya’s debate coach, and the uncertainty that what was there before between them could ever be a real thing or just a passing moment before they part again. It is about second chances, but also the complexity of denying Thomas Wolfe’s dictum that “you can’t go home again.” And let me tell you that Lambert’s simple shot from the heart doesn’t provide easy answers or Hallmark sincerity. These are two grownups who have a renewed chance but aren’t sure what the consequences will be, or whether they should even take it.
This is a perfect role for Pine, who is also a producer, as his Noah is a man comfortable with his life, his dog, being a dad and not looking to upend any of it. Although I didn’t initially think of Slate as the ideal love of his life, she is so appealing it ends any question you might have about the chemistry between these two, a chemistry so key the whole soufflé would fall if they got the casting wrong. That goes as well for Fortson, who is perfect as the daughter hoping to triumph with her debate skills but now caught between this awkward reunion of two people very much in her life. The supporting cast featuring some fine veteran actors including Sam Waterston, Katey Sagal, Jessica Harper and Jeffrey DeMunn is nice to see, however briefly they pop in and out.
Producers are Alex Saks, David Lipper, Robert A. Daly Jr, Ian Gotler and Pine.
Title: Carousel
Festival: Sundance (Premieres)
Director-screenwriter: Rachel Lambert
Cast: Chris Pine, Jenny Slate, Abby Ryder Fortson, Sam Waterston, Katey Sagal, Jessica Harper, Jeffrey DeMunn, Helene York
Sales agent: WME
Running time: 1 hr 45 mins
English (US) ·