Review: 50/50
(Originally reviewed in 2011)
50/50 is a film I went into knowing it would be good but what I didn’t know was how much I would enjoy it. What made the film so great to me is the same reason why I enjoyed Bridesmaids in that there’s a lot of heart; these are real situations that people can find themselves in and since 50/50 is based on the real life experiences of writer Will Reiser you can see the drama and realism through the comedy.
In the title role of Adam, Joseph Gordon-Levitt gives a great performance. At the start he seems stuck in a life that he doesn’t enjoy but doesn’t know how to get out of it, the news of the cancer gives him the fear and/or freedom to move on and do what he can with his (possibly) limited time left. JGL manages to go through the full spectrum of emotions from his weed-filled Hospital hallway walk to his mental breakdown in the car, the variety of emotions he goes through is something I believe most cancer patients would experience, especially if, like Adam, they led a healthy life and the news was a shock to their system. If he doesn’t receive a nomination something is wrong.
Seth Rogen’s is probably the best role he’s ever had – again since this is based on his friend’s experiences he had previous knowledge of what to do. I don’t know how truthful his role is but his actions do seem like those someone would do if they just heard his friend was going to die, unaware of how to react and trying his best to keep things the same. The fact that he’s vulgar before he knew about the cancer (‘No one likes putting a dick in their mouth’) but keeps that vulgarity throughout may seem like he’s insensitive but when Adam finds the book in Kyle’s apartment you get the sense that Kyle was trying to keep things as close to as they were before so as not to scare his friend or himself.
Adam’s therapist Katherine, played by Anna Kendrick was another great character and played brilliantly. It was a nice touch to make her a training doctor and not a professional because it made her more endearing, the fact that she wasn’t this absolutely perfect girl, she made mistakes and didn’t know what to do a lot of the time – as Adam says ‘We’re both beginners at this’. The flawed nature of her character and her informal treatment of Adam (‘You’re a shit’) is what made her better than just a normal doctor, I’ll go out on a limb and say she’ll get a supporting actress nod and deserving of it.
The three main performances plus everything else that was great, Adam’s caring if a little overbearing mother, the soundtrack and (SPOILER) making Mitch’s final moments happy before his sudden death amongst others all fit well together and prove this film as one of the year’s best. It’ll definitely be in the short-running for my end of year awards.
9/10