Noah Baumbach and Greta Gerwig have co-written a brilliantly funny, enjoyable and very smart New York-based film with Mistress America. Gerwig as Brooke is a thirtysomething, wacky, barely in control, self-described social media maven, self-taught interior style designer, pre-SAT tutor and sometime fitness instructor.
The famous female screwball comediennes of the thirties – Carole Lombard in My Man Godfrey and Katharine Hepburn of Bringing Up Baby – spring to mind. We revel in Brooke’s quirkiness, ditziness and jerkiness, knowing that she is doing a high wire act with her life without a visible net.
Though Brooke is brimming with enormous energy and self-confidence, she has significant flaws, which to the audience make her a very compelling character. And to me, a very appealing character.
With brings to mind our fearless leader, Stephen Harper.
But more about the Harper connection, later in this piece.
In New York, Brooke is thrown together with Tracy, a lonely Barnard College freshman, as their respective parents, Brooke’s dad and Tracy’s mom, are engaged to be married.
Brooke volunteers to be Tracy’s mentor and introduce Tracy to her very exciting New York life.
There are some terrific set pieces which demonstrate Gerwig’s amazing comedic talents: fearlessly running on and dancing onstage with a band at a oh so hip nightclub; climbing up her fire escape to her lofty loft and seducing investors to invest in her flighty family-style restaurant; tripping with her new “sister” Tracy in a car driven by Tracy’s nerdy Jewish ex-boyfriend and his hysterically funny and paranoid girlfriend.
This film is also Baumbach’s funniest, warmest and most open film and his directorial style is bang on brilliant.
Deep down we know that Brooke is all style and sizzle, with little of substance to show for all her crazy/funny schemes. She is terrific company. We would all love to spend a week-end hanging out with her in Times Square and doing Tequila shots with her in some Tribeca dive bar.
But I would not invest my hard-earned money with this very entertaining ditzy blonde, or even entrust her with managing anything of substance or worth. Her restaurant is doomed to ignominious failure and loss as well as all the other investors’ money.
Now do you see where I am going with this?
The ditzy brunette with the great hair, Trudeau, may seem appealing at first. Who wouldn’t want to party with this dude? But entrust him with our hard-earned tax dollars?
A guy who flippantly believes “the deficit will take care of itself” and his plan is to grow the economy “from the heart outward?”
Is Trudeau getting financial advice from Celine “My Heart Will Go On” Dion?
Is this the guy you want to entrust your job, your mortgage, your house and the future financial well-being of your children with?
The same questions can equally apply to the scary and duplicitous Tom Mulcair.
Hundreds of thousands of jobs, both directly and indirectly in Alberta and Ontario rely upon our oil and gas industry.
Clearly, Mulcair and his star Toronto candidate Linda McQuaig want to keep our valuable oil in the ground in favor of a disastrous Green Energy alternative.
What is wrong with these crazy ideologically-driven lunatics? How come they have not learned from Ontario Premier Wynne’s disastrous foray into heavily-subsidized and non-economic wind farms and solar energy?
For these myopic Dippers, the private sector and profits are still as dirty as our so-called “dirty oil.”
Who in their right financial minds would entrust their jobs, their incomes and their futures with these crazy people?
In comparison, there is Prime Minister Harper.
Okay, he has some personality flaws.
He is apparently cold, calculating and manipulative. Probably no one’s first choice to hang with while chowing down a bucket of wings and quaffing a pitcher of beer at St. Louis’ Ribs.
He has been vilified for being controlling and running a highly-disciplined and tightly-controlled administration and government.
But with the worldwide drop in oil, the decline in the Canadian dollar and the stock market, these are very serious times in Canada.
I would rather our country be led by a tough no nonsense, coldly logical and brutally pragmatic leader than Captain Kumbaya or Stompin’ Tom Mulcair who deep down, believes the solution is to tax, tax, tax. Borrow, borrow, borrow. And according to Mulcair’s other star – Olivia Chow – throw billions and billions of taxpayer money at every Canadian Native, child, senior and tree-hugging urban cyclist – Greek style. Opa!!!
By comparison, Harper – flaws and all – looks very appealing.
Mitch Wolfe: The Playful Contrarian 