In 'Suburbicon,' an Uncomfortable Mix of Film Elements

Home , Jordan Peele, Matt Damon, Suburbicon

CHICAGOLAWBULLETIN.COM FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 2017

Volume 163, No. 215 Serving Chicago’s legal community for 162 years

In ‘Suburbicon,’ an uncomfortable mix of film elements

t 4 a.m. on March 16, “Suburbicon,” director George pots and pans meant to drive 1952, a bomb explod - Clooney makes a similar mistake. them away, breaking their win - ed on the first floor of Which is not to say his movie dows and entering their home, my Aunt Florence’s is a turkey. vandalizing it, then marking it new duplex. Clooney wants to make the with a confederate flag — events AWith her earnest young hus - familiar point (driven into our based on the actual account of band, young daughter and mas - collective consciousness by REBECCA the first black family to move ter’s degree in social work from David Lynch’s “Blue Velvet”) that into the Levittown subdivision in UCLA, she was planning to while the surface of suburban L. F ORD 1957. change the world. communities may look perfectly “Suburbicon” is a good film, They were among the first groomed, below this spotless ve - funny with fine performances all African-Americans to move into neer lies hypocrisy, denial and Rebecca L. Ford is counsel at Scharf around. But it is confusing to the all-white Los Angeles neigh - deliberate ignorance — and all Banks Marmor LLC, and concentrates laugh at murder, then respectful - borhood of North Adams. The kinds of hell are breaking loose. her practice on complex litigation, ly sober up for race-mob may - Los Angeles Daily News reported In the current political cli - compliance, board governance and hem. It wouldn’t be impossible to that the bombers left a note in mate, Clooney didn’t believe he specialized employment issues. She is craft a storyline for the Mayer another black family’s mailbox could satirize midcentury subur - the former executive vice president for family that is both sympathetic made of letters cut from newspa - bia without addressing its racial litigation and intellectual property at and consistent in tone with the per headlines threatening, “We tension. Restrictive covenants MGM. She can be reached at rest of “Suburbicon.” will bomb off all Negros.” ran with the land beneath the [email protected]. Jordan Peele successfully did The neighbors took up a col - vast sprawl of nearly identical something similar in “Get Out.” lection to assist with repairs and homes that folk singer Pete after Gardner’s now-motherless As-is, the Mayers seem to exist formed a vigilance committee. Seeger described as “little boxes pre-adolescent son, Nicky (the only to telegraph the goodness of Decades later, at a West Coast just the same,” and middle-class excellent Noah Jupe). Nicky, through his friendship Thanksgiving celebration, leafing communities in places like Los Wound tight to begin with, with their son Andy (Tony Es - through family mementos, I Angeles, Cicero and Levittown, Gardner can’t seem to keep it to - pinosa). came across a news clipping of Pa., selectively terrorized its gether as the bodies pile up with This decent midbudget film the event. newcomers. comic ferocity, particularly after has been critically maligned “How cool,” I said, with the au - Clooney addresses this topic Bud (Oscar Isaac), the skeptical partly because expectations are thority of someone who had at - earnestly and cautiously and insurance claims analyst, ar - so high for a script originally tended a few college vigils. places the integration story gin - rives. Bud can smell the “faint conceived by the Coen Brothers “Put that away,” she said and gerly atop the main storyline. aroma of hanky-panky,” but he and with a cast bursting with left the room. “I don’t want to be Distractingly different in mood doesn’t smell it here. No, “this star power but also to punish reminded of that.” and tone, it seems to sit there, one stinks.” Clooney’s pretty-boy, Hollywood- To me the clippings described precariously, like an odd hat. Murder, infidelity, child neg - style liberalism. a righteous political stand. To my In the dominant storyline, lect. Ironically, no one ever no - Clooney has said his film is not aunt, they recounted the night Gardner Lodge (Matt Damon) tices. The commotion is over at about the African-American ex - someone tried to kill her family. hires goons to murder his wife the home of the new “Negro” perience but about “white angst” Even in appreciation, I had and make the hit look like a rob - family, the Mayers (Karimah — anxiety and fear of displace - treated the matter too lightly. bery. His sister-in-law Margaret Westbrook and Leith M. ment by minorities. In his blood-spattered spoof of (Julianna Moore) moves in im - Burke), where the neighbors are There seems to be plenty 1950s suburban dystopia, mediately, ostensibly to look creating a calamitous noise with enough of that to go around.