The Meddler (2016)

Touches You

I wanted to but couldn't!

Fantastic!

This is a must-see and one of the best documentaries - and films - of this year.

Yes, there are some pretty big A-listers in this film....Rose Byrne, Susan Sarandon, J.K.Simmons, Jason Ritter, etc...but just because you have some well known faces in your film, it doesn't mean that you have a great film. That should be the takeaway here. My mom is a longtime fan of Susan Sarandon so I watched the film with her. Both of us were bored to tears. The uninteresting life of Marnie and her daughter just seemed to go on for ever and ever and ever. There's no climax in this film, no payoff. Nothing. It just goes on and ends and that's it. There wasn't even any indication that it was even building up to something. It's just the boring story of a mom and her daughter living in L.A. There is no reason to watch this film at all, because it's just a re- enactment of "REAL LIFE". Hell, you're probably living Marnie's life right now and I bet you're more interesting than Marnie.

'The Meddler', a 2015 film starring Susan Sarandon and Rose Byrne is a sweet, feel-good film. Marnie (Sarandon), is a mother who can't come to grips with losing her husband of several decades, and initially directs all of her attention into her daughter Lori's (Byrne) life. When Lori rebuffs her mother's VERY overwhelming involvement in her affairs, Marnie starts getting involved with anyone who makes her feel needed. Refreshingly, none of these people take advantage of her kindness and extreme generosity. Admittedly, there were quite a few flaws with this movie. The character of Mark (Michael McKeon) was completely unnecessary and added nothing to the film. Jason Ritter played Jacob, Lori's ex-love, and she spent the entire movie grieving the loss of her relationship with him. Ritter was woefully miscast in this part, as there was zero chemistry between him and Byrne. And, the product placement was WAY overdone. I can't believe how many references there were to iPads, iPhones, etc. Obvious and annoying.Beautifully cast, however, was Oscar winner J.K. Simmons as Zipper, a potential romantic interest for Marnie. The sweet scenes they shared in his chicken coop were delightful.All in all, this was a feel-good flick. Predictable, yet pleasant. But due to its many issues could only give 6* out of 10.

I guess this was what they call a "chick-flick". Simply one of the most boring, going- nowhere-meandering, "what's this nonsense about?" movies of all time. Can I please have my 1 hour back I wasted on this so called movie? I'll never get it back... Gave up waiting for something interesting to happen after an hour of total boredom. A depressing movie with plenty of substance abuse, dysfunctional, and immoral relationships.How do these silly movies get made? What a total waste. Susan Sarandon is OK but she is actually in one giant annoying role.Stay away, plenty of other entertaining movies around...

We watched this at home on DVD from our public library. The writer/director makes interesting, somewhat quirky comedies about life, but not slapstick comedy. Good writing and a good cast add up to a very entertaining viewing experience.The DVD has a good extra about "the real Marne". The whole story is derived from the real life relationship of the filmmaker and her mother, during one of her other projects she told her mother "The next script I'm going to write is about you and I'm going to call it The Meddler."Susan Sarandon, almost 70 in real life, is Marnie, her long time husband had died a year or so earlier, and he had left her very well off financially. So she moved from New Jersey to Los Angeles to be near her adult daughter who works in the movie and TV industry.The daughter is played by Australian actress, Rose Byrne, using her best American accent as Lori. The first 20 minutes or so I wasn't at all confident that I would like the movie, Marne was meddling a bit too much and Lori seemed a bit too passive-aggressive, but as the story settled in it became nicely interesting. It really is Marne's story, when Lori has to go to New York for a while to shoot a pilot (not that kind of pilot) Marne gets to explore her own life more. She gets into a volunteer job at a hospital. She meets a woman who wants to re-marry her wife so Marne buys her a wedding dress and rents a yacht for the event. Her therapist wonders if using her money like that is a way of "buying friendship and acceptance."But Marnie's life gets really interesting when she is walking around and happens upon an outdoor movie shoot, she is mistaken for an extra and goes along with it. In the process she meets J.K. Simmons who is retired police officer Zipper (his last name), working easy security for the shoot. Marne is not ready to jump into any sort of relationship but she accepts his friendship, visits him in the canyon, where he grows chickens for their eggs. Just a very pleasant man who also plays guitar and sings with a nice, mellow baritone.Is this a chick flick? I don't know, I hate to put labels on movies, but it is a very realistic story and watching the story unfold with some great actors, this guy enjoyed it very much.