Walking by IFC Saturday night, my wife spied Lucky Them, which was screening that evening with a Q&A afterward, featuring the director Megan Griffiths, the writer Emily Wachtel, one of the supporting actors, and Dick Cavett of all people (he was the moderator). So we instantly changed plans and darted in to the film, which was starting in 5 minutes. We’re very glad we did. It’s one of the few bright spots in a so far embarrassingly bad year of cinema.

Any film that lets the magnificent Toni Collette take a strong, sexy leading role and freely exhibit all of her copious talent is a very welcome film indeed! In Lucky Them, she plays a middle-aged music critic, mentally stuck in a haunted past, who is forced by her editor to find and interview a brilliant songwriter who completely disappeared decades ago, and who she had dated shortly before his disappearance. The screenplay is not super deep or super interesting, but it’s well-crafted, the characters are sketched beautifully, and there is a pleasing quirkiness and charm to the dialog and the unfolding story – it’s funny, human, and consistently engaging, with a very satisfying ending. The film’s direction is superb; it has an amazing sense of place, is paced well, and the supporting and incidental casting and acting is damn near perfectly realized. (My wife and I agreed it’s been a long time since we’ve seen a film that caught all the incidental characters so memorably, without ever calling undo attention to any of them – brava Megan Griffiths!) And Toni Collette’s performance is the kind of performance that should win major awards, but never does – effortless, nuanced, like she’s not even acting, a joy to watch. She’s certainly a front-runner for an award here at Irreviews, for what it’s worth.

If there is any problem with this film, it’s Thomas Haden Church. He’s an actor I’ve strongly disliked in everything since Sideways, and he was tolerable there mainly because his schtick was perfectly complimented (and rendered charming) by Paul Giamatti’s brilliant performance. My reaction to him in Lucky Them was somewhat mixed. I found his robotic presence and delivery a little too distracting for my taste, especially in the midst of natural, unaffected performances surrounding him on all sides. But perhaps because the role was specifically written for him, and perhaps because Griffiths drew a bit more humanity out of him than he usually gives, Church is fairly enjoyable, and even at times a bit endearing, as the weird and awkward rich guy Charlie who tags along on Toni Collette’s journalistic search. Maybe I should sum it up this way: the film is strong enough to survive his relentlessly monochromatic persona; I’m just not sure he adds very much to the film.

In the Q&A afterward, someone asked if it was difficult getting a film made with a forty year old female lead who actually looks forty years old; the answer was: “it’s almost impossible”, not that anyone should find that surprising. They mentioned that independent film is the only place you can commit such a sacrilege, but also alluded to the 12 year struggle to get this film made, and that’s with Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward behind it! But what I find fascinating is there are more and more of these lovely little fringe movies attracting stars who are clearly just desperate to utter lines of dialog that aren’t humiliating. Lucky Them is a perfect example, as is The Motel Life, Hateship,Loveship, All the Light in the Sky, Afternoon Delight, and Free Ride, to name just a few recent ones. Things are so bad in Hollywood (and also in mainstream independent films) that a whole cottage-industry is coalescing, partly fueled by the needs of stars that want to do something more than play a cop, a criminal, a victim, or a machine.

I highly recommend Lucky Them. I don’t know what kind of distribution it’s getting (it’s at IFC, so probably none), but if you get a chance, go see it. You won’t be sorry.