Dir. Thomas McCarthy, USA, 106mins, 2011
Cast: Paul Giamatti, Amy Ryan, Jeffrey Tambor, Alex Shaffer
Review by Matthew Rodgers
Usually you know what to expect with a Paul Giamatti movie; a wonderfully self deprecating performance depicting a schlubby protagonist battling against the day-to-day trials and expectations of life. Good as that might be, there’s only so many times that you can praise the same morosely enjoyable performance.
Win Win might appear to be a case of “same old, same old”, as Giamatti plays Mike Flaherty, a failing attorney, bereft of clients, suffering from stress, with his only release being his moonlighting activities as the high school coach of a useless wrestling team. Lady Luck pays both faltering sides of his life a visit when some shady dealings lead to the lucrative discovery via Leo (Burt Young), a client with dementia and his grandson Kyle (Shaffer) a rookie grappler, of a way that the two them can be used solve Mike’s financial and sporting problems. But as with all Faustian dilemmas, the situation worsens when the boy’s rehabilitated mother comes to town to throw a spanner in the works.
What Station Agent director McCarthy is so good at is the portrayal of small town America and the genteel way in which heightened situations are played out using real characters. Win Win has the propensity to become farce or your typical against-the-odds, Good Will Hunting style dramedy, but the way in which it unfolds, simultaneously funny and moving, never feels forced or fake in the way that so many cliché riddled Indies can. If you liked Drew Barrymore’s criminally underrated Whip It, then the chances are you’ll like this.
Rather predictably much of the enjoyment comes from Giamatti’s turn, as the film rests on his hunched shoulders, and although his sad-sack routine is prominent, it’s his bond with Kyle and the confident aspects of Mike that resonate the most.
In fact, all of the cast are on fine form; from newcomer Shaffer to the funny on sight Jeffrey Tambor and the stoically moralistic Amy Ryan as Flaherty’s suffering wife. It’s this ensemble that lifts Win Win from its arthouse trappings to must see cinema.
It does work itself out a little too neatly in a Capraesque “win win” way, but not once does that undermine the relationships or emotionally satisfying payoff.
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