REIGN OVER ME

US, 2007, 124 minutes, Colour.
Adam Sandler, Don Cheadle, Jada Pinkett- Smith, Liv Tyler, Saffron Burrows, Donald Sutherland, Robert Klein, Melinda Dillon, Mike Binder, Jonathan Banks.
Directed by Mike Binder.

There is so much in this film to recommend.

Adam Sandler’s comedies tend to be an acquired taste, especially those early airhead movies like Happy Gilmore and Billy Madison. But, over the years, Sandler has built up his reputation with stronger comedies and with attempts to do serious roles. He was effective in Punch Drunk Love and Spanglish and could hold his own with Jack Nicholson in Anger Management. He made 2006’s Click an above average comedy with dramatic edge. In Reign over Me, he is very good.

Why the title? Writer-director Mike Binder says that The Who’s album, Quadrophenia, was a favourite and that he listened to it while writing. Pete Townshend wrote ‘Reign o’er me’, that is ‘love reign o’er me’ and it is sung throughout the film. This is a film about love and friendship.

While we see Sandler’s character, Charlie Fineman, riding a motorised scooter through the night streets of New York City during the credits, the initial focus of the film is on Don Cheadle’s character, dentist and family man, Alan Johnson. One day Alan glimpses Charlie and tries to make contact. They had been roommates together while studying dentistry. We learn that Charlie’s wife and three young daughters were all killed in the flight from Boston on September 11th 2001. He has now dropped out of life and blocked his memories.

This is a film about deeper than surface friendships. Charlie obviously needs friendship and love. His in-laws are too imposing. His best friend and lawyer is rejected because he reminds him of his former life. He is protected by his dragon-lady landlady, plays drums in a band and watches Mel Brooks comedies and television. He is unkempt, keeps remodelling his apartment kitchen (a sad reason for his emerges towards the end of the film) and plays a magic-themed computer game. How can his life be reclaimed? Should it be? Should friends intrude? Should they organise therapy?

Adam Sandler makes a convincing character of Charlie, of his grief, pathos and self-pity.

Alan tries to help. As they resume their friendship, it is clear that Charlie actually helps Alan. He is a successful dentist and has set a corporation practice – which, despite the efforts of his sardonic dragon-lady receptionist – is under threat because a mentally disturbed patient (Saffron Burrows), who has her own sad story of betrayal, makes advances and threatens to sue Alan for sexual harassment. At home, his devoted wife (Jada Pinkett Smith) is something of a controller and he feels the need for some kind of breathing space. Don Cheadle is persuasive and very watchable.

The interactions between Charlie and Alan have their moving (as well as funny) ups and downs. Mike Binder has written his screenplay so well that we are often torn in our responses: exasperation with Charlie’s outbursts, admiration for his courage, empathy with his traumatised condition; wanting Alan to succeed with Charlie, hurt by some of Charlie’s responses to him, wondering whether Alan is being too much of a do-gooder, hoping that Alan will find better ways of communicating with his wife.

Liv Tyler appears as a young psychotherapist in Alan’s building to whom Charlie eventually goes for help. The sessions are awkward. He holds back. But, the scene where, unexpectedly for the audience, Charlie starts to unburden himself to Alan is most moving.

It doesn’t end there. It starts to go the American way of the gun as Charlie becomes both aggressive and suicidal. But this provides the occasion for plot development where Charlie is examined for his mental state and the courts have to decide what is best for him. This is a very fine part of the film, full of decency and humanity, help immensely by one of Donald Sutherland’s best cameo performances as the presiding judge.

Some British reviewers, of the stiff-upper-lip school of endurance, scoffed at Charlie’s mental state and wondered how he would have coped with the Blitz. Yes, Americans are more heart on sleeve people and their traumas are less concealed or repressed than those of their British counterparts. And…, that was then, this is now and the events of September 2001 were a shock of unforeseen magnitude.

1.The impact of the film? Emotional? The title, the song, the Who? The use of the song throughout the film? Love reigns? Friendship?

2.The importance of New York City, the aftermath of September 11, 2001, the streets, day and night, apartments, clubs, dentists’ surgeries, cinemas, ordinary life, traffic? Authentic feel of the city? The musical score and songs?

3.The film’s focus: friendship, hope after grief, trauma, mutual help, therapy and healing?

4.The credits and Charlie on his scooter through the city, at night? A symbol of what had happened to him? His having Alan on the scooter as a passenger? Symbol of bonding? Alan at the end – alone on the scooter? Sense of freedom?

5.Alan’s story, middle age, his marriage, the children? His wife bossing him about? His work and skills as a dentist, with patients? The group corporation – and their critical attitudes when the lawsuit was threatened? Mona, the dragon lady receptionist, her sardonic remarks? Humour? The variety of patients? Donna, striking, Mona’s reaction, the tensions in her visits, her sexual offer, Alan’s reaction? The threat to sue? The revisit, talking with her, her embarrassment, leaving? His interest in asking Angela questions, waiting outside the building? Her handling of his questions? His glimpses of Charlie, the decision to follow him?

6.The impressions of Charlie, memories of his past, study, his behaviour in college, sleeping naked etc? Tough? His marriage, the children, his work as a dentist? The suddenness of the deaths? His mental and emotional collapse? The remuneration and his setting up his apartment? The landlady and her dogged protecting of him? His in-laws and their interference? Their not understanding? His reactions, blocking the past, blocking the memories, his not allowing Bryan Sugarman to help even though they had been close friends? His denial, remodelling the kitchen (and the later reason for doing this, his wife’s wanting it and their clash)? His playing the video game? The music on his iPod, the music stores, playing the drums in the band, the jamming session with Alan?

7.Alan and the discussions with Charlie, making contact, trying to remember the past, Charlie and his vagueness? Yet Alan learning? Asking questions, going out, the discussions about different musical tastes, food, going to the band, going to the Mel Brooks comedies, Alan feeling freer? Talking to Charlie about his marriage, about the harassment case? The impact of his father’s death? Charlie and his inappropriate reactions, his apologies, offering the million dollars? Alan and his talking with his wife, the phone calls, Charlie’s visits, the meals, the children’s reaction, coping? The issue of permissions to go out with Charlie? Alan and his wanting to help, the danger of being a do-gooder? Discussion with Angela? The fiasco of inviting Nigel and the meal together, meeting in the music shop, pretending it was by accident, Charlie seeing through it and insulting Nigel?

8.Janeane and her love for her husband, yet her tensions, the phone calls, feeling that they were not communicating, the phone call about his father’s death? Charlie’s visit? Coping? Alan and his parents, the visit to them, their not talking to each other? The funeral? The arrival of the lawyer?

9.The grief of the funeral, the effect on Alan, Bryan Sugarman arriving, the issue of the million dollars, the apology, his being invited to come in and eat? Talking about Charlie? Bryan’s past friendship and inability to do anything?

10.The music, the discussion of tastes, the records, smelling the vinyl, the jam session, Charlie playing at the club?

11.Angela, a young psychotherapist? Alan and his asking her questions, her handling of the situation? Charlie visiting, talking, wanting to stop? Her style and agreement with him? Wanting to end the sessions, Charlie’s unhappiness – but his sitting, his unburdening himself of the whole story to Alan, Alan and the tension, Angela hearing it? Charlie and his ability to go back over his life, his love for his wife and children, the final day, his regrets, the clash with his wife before she left? The effect of unburdening himself?

12.The effect on Charlie in terms of depression, becoming suicidal, getting the gun, the road rage, pulling the gun, the police watching, taking him, prison? Alan and Bryan present, Angela coming to the police station? The decision that he have the tests, a fortnight of tests? The staff at Roosevelt Island, their conclusions?

13.The court hearing, the judge, his wisdom in presiding, the brash prosecutor and his inappropriate questions, the in-laws and their reactions, their incomprehension, the wife and her being upset about the broken vase? Charlie and his reaction, the issue of the photos? His grief? The judge wanting order?

14.The meeting in chambers, the judge telling the brash lawyer to shut up, the in-laws and his advice, giving them the weekend, asking for compassion?

15.The apartment, Charlie packing up, taking the video game? The humour with his teaching Alan to play the video game – and Alan being addictive? The move, the landlady, the in-laws arriving, the vase? The plea for a sense of humanity for Charlie?

16.Trauma, therapy, love and friendship, possibilities and hope?