Flasz On Film

If I ever decided to make a movie, I would have the luxury of being able to fail while nobody’s looking. I could learn by doing without ever thinking that someone out there—a critic, no less—would have it out for me. Maybe I’d submit whatever I put together to some festivals and pay the required fees to ensure that someone would watch my stuff, evaluate it and decide if it’s good enough for public consumption. And even at that, the scale of this consumption would likely be limited to a single screening in the middle of a working day and maybe a handful of daredevil amateur critics willing to write about terrible movies in order to churn their way out of the freelance gutter would see my movie online as well.

In fact, I’m kind of doing it right now. I have spent years tapping into a keyboard and iteratively honing my craft in an eerily quiet corner of the Internet. I’ve seen the numbers. I know my place. I’m fine, thanks.

That’s why I find it on one hand fascinating, and on the other mind-bogglingly terrifying, to watch movies directed by actors, screenwriters, and even critics, trying their hand at running the asylum that is film production. They don’t get to have that luxury. They have to learn the ropes while in the limelight. Granted, they have already spent numerous years observing the process from the sidelines and participating in it in a different capacity. They know people. They can seek advice. Still, they frequently don’t get to hide away their duds in a drawer the way I could. Remember when Ryan Gosling directed Lost River? Exactly.

Therefore, I find it even more rewarding when I see actors who can successfully demonstrate their competence behind the camera, even if their output might not always maintain stellar quality. Bradley Cooper, for whom Is This Thing On? counts as his third directorial effort, has most assuredly experienced success with his emotionally devastating remake of A Star Is Born, and his 2023 Maestro; though, the latter was more of a critical darling than a crowd-pleaser. Taken together, Cooper’s first two films garnered fifteen Oscar nominations and one victory—Best Song for A Star Is Born—in addition to a number of other accolades. This would suggest that not only has Bradley Cooper made a successful transition to directing, but that he immediately became a bit of a prestige darling, much like Ben Affleck fifteen years ago.

However, Cooper’s newest film Is This Thing On? looks on paper as though it was poised to break that trend. It was clearly positioned by its distributors to enter the awards fray with its premiere at the New York Film Festival and a wide roll-out around Christmas (and it is about to open in the UK as of writing of these words) but the recently announced Oscar nominations ignored this movie completely. And at this point, the provocative thing to say would be that it was a big mistake, followed by a hyperbolic statement that this movie is the best thing since the invention of the sausage roll. I’m not sure I’m ready to commit this hard just yet.

What I am prepared to do, however, is tell you that in contrast to the more prestige-slanted Maestro, Is This Thing On? sees Bradley Cooper return to the space that made his debut so innately powerful. Loosely inspired by the real story of John Bishop, a pharma rep-turned-comedian who signed up for an open mic night—just because—after his marriage fell apart, this is the kind of story that Cooper is particularly well-equipped to flesh out in a way that is relatable, emotionally charged and with the right balance of bitterness and sweetness.

In a way, Is This Thing On? is an unlikely challenger in the space of relationship dramedies where Noah Baumbach has ruled as the hegemon for a number of years now. Though, I’m not sure I’m happy with this characterization as it is ultimately imprecise. In contrast to Baumbach, whose movies emphasize the “dram” in the word “dramedy,” this thing leans heavier towards “medy,” if that makes any sense. It is a movie that is assembled more in a comedic tradition with a supple dramatic core than the other way around. Which makes it incredibly watchable, and consequently, the viewer might be surprised by the dramatic nuance explored in the film, not to mention emotional resonance it is bound to have with its target demographic.

After all, this is very much a middle-age movie aimed to reverberate with people who won’t need much explanation to connect some dots and understand just how well the central human drama in here is woven. This story about two people (played by Will Arnett and Laura Dern) whose relationship didn’t collapse in outright acrimony, like you’d expect from something like Marriage Story, is therefore incredibly lifelike. A couple grows apart and make a grown-up decision to split while making sure their two children wouldn’t take unnecessary flak in consequence of their decision to part ways. And although the story is mostly focused on the plight of the husband—who moves out and starts doing stand-up initially as a coping mechanism and self-therapy and eventually because he discovers that it brings him the kind of happiness he lacked for many years—its narrative hints at greater complexity. Arnett’s character learns to express long-suppressed emotions in front of complete strangers, while Dern’s character wrestles with her own unresolved regrets of cutting short her career as an athlete and not being able to find her purpose anew.

As a result, Is This Thing On? becomes a bittersweet anti-rom-com orbiting a theme of resentment that is inherently built into the process of maturing as an adult. Although the movie doesn’t spend too much time explicitly tackling this—at no point do any characters spell everything out for all to learn—viewers who have lived on this Earth for long enough and those who might be struggling with similar issues right now will be able to identify the emotional complexity handled by this story about a guy who starts doing comedy to cope with depression. That’s because nobody ever tells you what life is going to be like for real. We spend our youth dreaming about greatness, work hard, find a kindred spirit to build a life with… and make a tonne of mistakes along the way. We grit our teeth and hope that next week some of our problems will dissipate or get solved, not realizing that life is supposed to be hard and that mistakes are a feature, not a bug. But sometimes we need to make drastic decisions to give ourselves the required perspective to see what we did wrong, how we hurt those we thought we loved and that they might have hurt us for the same reason we hurt them—because they didn’t know any better. Because we are all winging it.

And I don’t know, but a movie like this—again, on paper—has no business being this layered and saturated with ambiguous and complex emotional conversations. After all, it is still a funny film that leans heavily into Will Arnett’s stand-up performances—which are great, by the way—and whose narrative still resembles a formulaic rom-com about two people breaking up, roaming aimlessly for a little while and eventually figuring out that they want to get back together. What sets Is This Thing On? apart is the honesty with which the story is told and the intimacy with which it is all conveyed.

And that’s where I think Bradley Cooper deserves a pat on the back as a director who just has a knack to get this kind of messaging across. I honestly believe that his pedigree in acting positions him quite well to give his performers the necessary tools and space to generate sufficient artistic authenticity, without which this movie would surely fall apart like a Jenga tower of manufactured schmaltz. The safe environment cultivated for the purposes of telling this story allowed both the singular performances and the relationships between characters to gather some colour. As a result, the central thesis of the narrative about those many flavours of resentment and unaddressed grief over relationships those characters thought they had—and in a rather Allen-meets-Baumbach-esque style, the movie adds further layers to this thematic discourse by introducing supporting players with these similar problems too—becomes ever livelier, holistic and fundamentally approachable.

Thus, Is This Thing On? transcends the parameters of its format. On top of allowing an actor like Will Arnett, who is mostly known for his purely comedic performances, to spread his wings a little, the viewer gets that coveted front-row seat to witness something they might immediately recognize because it is a reflection of a general middle-aged reality. As the camera stays glued to his shoulder—and if I had one technical remark to pass on to Bradley Cooper, it is that I think he keeps his camera slightly too low, angled upwards, in many of his handheld shots which throws me off a little and makes me lose my bearings—we are allowed to make a personal investment in his performance and consequently in the unfolding drama.

Bittersweet, authentic and prioritizing dramatic connection over experimentation with the narrative format, Bradley Cooper’s third movie is hence a confirmation that the guy has the right sensibilities to make great films. In fact, this one is already almost there, even though naysayers might be able to land a few jabs here and there on the back of the film’s predictable format or its prestige sheen; which I think is just a part of Cooper’s toolbox at this point. But as far as I am concerned, if a movie can execute well and find a way to the viewer’s heart, it is doing a great job already. In fact, it’s doing the only job it was ever supposed to do.