May December

Starring: Natalie Portman, Julianne Moore, Charles Melton

Director: Todd Haynes

Gracie (Moore) and her husband Joe (Melton) seem to be living the idyllic life in their quiet Georgia town with their children who are about to graduate and leave for college. Things begin to unravel when Elizabeth (Portman), an aspiring actress, arrives in town to research the couple and dig into their scandalous past for an upcoming film role as Gracie. Decades prior, Gracie and Joe made national headlines because of their relationship while Joe was in 7th grade. While it appears that the town loves the couple despite this, as Elizabeth goes deeper and talks to the other people involved she discovers this is not the case. In search of something "real" that she can hold on to for her upcoming role, Elizabeth soon finds herself more than a casual observer which causes a further rift in Gracie and Joe's fragile relationship.

If the story sounds familiar, it is loosely based on the famous Mary Kay Letourneau case, where she was found guilty of raping one of her 6th grade students. After serving a lengthy prison sentence, during which she gave birth to two children with the student, they got married. It's one of those "too weird to be true stories" that unfortunately very much happened.

While it isn't officially based on that true story, the aftermath of a very similar situation gets put under the microscope here by director Todd Haynes. It's very uncomfortable to sit through at times based on the subject matter, but it becomes especially difficult once Portman's Elizabeth begins her investigation. As much as the movie calls into question Gracie and Joe's role in everything that has happened, it similarly does for the role of the actor as well. Elizabeth does some highly questionable things, like visit the scene of their first rendezvous and recreate the moment the romance began. She occasionally has conversations with the director on the phone as well, which also do their part to curl toenails. There is one part where they talk about casting the child actor who will be playing young Joe and Elizabeth makes a comment about them being "sexy" It's a bit much but is there to show the industry's not so casual role in bringing true stories to life. I did like that the more Elizabeth dug into the case and interviewed the people living in the town, like with Gracie's ex-husband, they gave off a vibe that no one in the town is actually happy with the situation. But on the flipside no one is really doing anything about it. Haynes, for his part, knows exactly what buttons he is trying to push as even the soundtrack has a "TV movie of the week" feel.

Moore (reuniting with Haynes for a third time after Safe and Far from Heaven) and Portman are great but both are overshadowed by Charles Melton as Joe. Out of everyone in the film you actually feel sympathy for him, which is something you can't say about either of the leading ladies. If anything from the film gets recognized, it should be Melton's performance. There is a lot going on with the character psychologically and his stilted delivery and almost child-like mental state helps cement how complicated it must have been for Joe growing up and having to live with everything that happened. He and Moore have a fantastic scene late in the movie where he calls into question whether he was old enough to consent to anything that happened when he was younger that will break your heart and Melton nails the pain of the scene beautifully.

Yes, its a good and thought-provoking movie. But given the subject it's not one I can enthusiastically recommend because, to be honest, I just felt icky watching it. But hey, its what Haynes wanted and he definitely achieved it.

Grade: B+

May December is available on Netflix