Worst to best in the same year
Writer/director Tom McCarthy made one of the worst movies of 2015. He also made one of the best. How the same capable filmmaker could make both in the same year is a mystery worthy of its own documentary.
The better movie, “Spotlight,” just arrived in Coeur d’Alene this week. It’s excellent enough to forget about the magical-realism hogwash of McCarthy’s first 2015 effort, the Adam Sandler dud, “The Cobbler.”
“The Cobbler” is now available for streaming on Netflix Instant, and its awfulness is (almost) worthy of your attention. Sandler has made plenty of terrible movies, but “The Cobbler” isn’t terrible in the way the (former) comedian’s movies usually are. It isn’t the product of Sandler’s laziness. It’s the product of a good filmmaker trying too hard with a wackadoo concept.
Before 2015, McCarthy was known for a string of solid independent dramas, including “The Station Agent,” “Win, Win” and “The Visitor,” which earned its star, Richard Jenkins, an Oscar nomination. McCarthy himself earned an Oscar nomination as a co-screenwriter on Disney/Pixar’s “Up.”
His films are filled with carefully-drawn characters, which makes the existence of “The Cobbler” all the more baffling. Sandler plays a lonely, soft-spoken New York shoe repairman who discovers the magical ability to take the physical appearance of his customers, as long as he can fit in their shoes. That premise seems like the typical Sandler nonsense, but McCarthy makes little effort to mine the concept for laughs.
Instead, “The Cobbler” becomes an escalating series of awkward-to-creepy scenes where Sandler’s character meddles in the lives of the shoe owners. As a handsome DJ, he hits on the DJ’s girlfriend and spies on her in the shower. As a local gangster, he gets entangled in a number of serious crimes. As his long-absent father, he goes on a date with his ailing mother.
It’s very strange. And awkward.
By the end, there’s murder, character-reversals, and a particularly baffling scene that tries to place Sandler’s cobbler into a greater universe of magic tradesmen/planetary protectors.
The film is consistently, spectacularly bad, although made with the love and confidence of a good filmmaker. If there’s a positive, “The Cobbler” fails while trying to be good, which can’t be said of many Sandler-produced movies in recent years.
“Spotlight,” on the other hand, is McCarthy at his best, and the film delivers on a larger scale than any of his previous movies. Based on true events, the film follows a group of investigative reporters at the Boston Globe in 2001 as they uncover a massive sexual abuse scandal within the Catholic church. It is heavily inspired by journalism classics like “All the President’s Men,” and the overall execution deserves consideration alongside that great film.
The power of “Spotlight” builds in scene after scene of reporters knocking on doors, digging through files and collecting tiny bits of information on a story that eventually shook the entire world. There is no lead in the story, as the film splits time between reporters and editors played by the likes of Michael Keaton, Rachel McAdams and Mark Ruffalo, but the casting top-to-bottom is uniformly excellent. The actors who play abuse victims, many of whom only appear in single scenes, are particularly good at breaking open the film’s devastating emotional core.
The fact-based “Spotlight” is new territory for McCarthy, serving as director and co-screenwriter, and the just-the-facts tone serves as a welcome contrast to the heartstring hooey of “The Cobbler.” “Spotlight” has compelling history already on its side, and McCarthy lets the film explode into emotion only at rare, significant moments. That restraint, coupled with a keen execution of classical procedural storytelling, makes “Spotlight” one of the best movies to come out of 2015 so far, and the best piece of investigative drama since David Fincher’s “Zodiac.”
Even if “The Cobbler” goes down as the absolute low point of McCarthy’s career, the filmmaker has obviously proven his ability to rebound. If only Adam Sandler could find a way to rescue himself from the torture of his recent career choices.
Tyler Wilson can be reached at twilson@cdapress.com.