Country: USA
Movie Review: Two times Oscar-nominated, Jessica Chastain, phenomenal as usual, and James McAvoy, play a damaged couple in love, but having to endure a separation for undetermined time in order to deal with the worst wound of their lives: the lost of their only son. Eleanor (Chastain) tries to retrieve her balance after a failed suicide attempt, deciding to ‘disappear’ from the life of her friends and especially from Connor (McAvoy), her husband, who doesn’t give up on her while struggles to keep his restaurant. For some time, she consents to live with her parents who show different postures towards her. Her father, Julian (William Hurt), is a respected professor who adopts a talkative and helpful attitude, while her mother, Maria (Isabelle Huppert) is a French musician who seems a bit cold and evinces a sort of indifference regarding her daughter’s emotional state. Returning to college, Eleanor only feels some solace with her father’s colleague, professor Friedman (Viola Davis), and when is in the company of her sister Katie (Jess Weixler). Writer-director Ned Benson creates a mournful family portrait composed by trauma and sadness, where the pace is constant and the narrative often chokes in its characters’ suffering. Benson tries to minimize these moments with a couple of happy scenes from the past of the couple. Even emotionally flawed in its final part and relying on a few aspects that simply didn’t work out for me, “The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby” was capable to deliver a strong message: everyone has a different process to heal wounds; a ‘disappearance’ can be of vital importance in cases like this.
