Synopsis
Demolition is a 2015 drama film that reflects on emotions as well as tends on to grief orientation and personal transformations. It tells the story of Davis Mitchell and investment banker who lives in New York City. To the outside world, everything in Davis’s life seems to be going well. He has a nice job and a lovely wife, and is a financially of. But that is until his wife Julia unexpectedly dies in a car collision. This is where Davis’s life starts to fall apart.
Davis’s emotional perception towards the deceased wife is very peculiar. Unlike the social norms of openly sobbing, expressing grief and pain, Davis psychologically remains the exact opposite. His grief is hardly real and his sadness is wished. This is where the shattering point of the story is, concerning husband of Julia, father in law and examination partner Phil. Phil tries to convince Davis to step outside of the anger storm and grieve, but his brain has not been trained on how to start the process.
Davis’s ordeal with the vending machine and the subsequent note is what the author describes as the turning point of the narrative. The machine, after eating his money, prompted him to send a grievance letter to the vending machine company. A grievance letter was the last thing he sent as that turned into a fever pitch of personal letters that spoke of the changing tides with his marriage, profession, and the chilling void that Julia’s absence left. These personal letters echoed and echoed into his deepest feelings, and that something as trivial as a vending machine could elicit letters of this tone and nature said a lot about the former, and could easily pass as a poor way of moving on.
One letter, in particular, goes on to explain that as the company’s customer service representative, he was assigned to the letters on the complaint and was unlucky enough to cross paths with this particular one. He was lacking many aspects of life, but was trying to wrap his head around captivity and reality swim free. The normalities of life to balance out the frenzy of a son like Chris and work was slowly indulging him, when the letter was heard. With her life all over the place like a jigsaw puzzle, he decided, line by line, to assemble what had been. Disparate as they were, a wondrous friendship was born between the three.
The more time he spends alongside Karen and Chris, the more Davis accepts the complicated realities of his marriage. He understands that despite loving Julia, their relationship had become superficial and that he had gone along with it without truly knowing himself. Davis also begins to engage in both literal and metaphorical forms of restructuring and fragmentation in order to destroy the cycle of life rigidity he had constructed around himself. He begins to disassemble characteristics of his life, to include: furniture, gadgets, and even sections of the very house he had built, in order to seek to understand the whys and hows of their operation to gain mastery over his turbulent feelings.
The disassembling of his house and structures around the house also became a way to show his metaphorical self transformation. To an extent, he begins to disassemble the structures of emotional detachment. He becomes liberated from the emotional bondage as he begins to weave and intertwine relations with Karen and Chris. It also allows him the gratification of looking the life from a new lens that is naked, deeper, and sophisticated. He is also able to reclaim his ability to experience such feelings as pain, affection, and the emotion of love.
With Each advancing moment, Davis has primary objectives in which would be to honor the legacy of his wife, and accomplish those objectives through self improvement and self awareness instead of big and grandiose ways. Davis reestablishes contact and not only rebuilds left and right, but his mentality and emotions as well. In the end it looked as though the film was trying to illustrate there’s always a chance to regain a sense of purpose, and restart, even after experiencing a terrible loss.
Cast & Crew
Main Cast
Jake Gyllenhaal as Davis Mitchell
Jake Gyllenhaal performs a dual role as Davis and plays one of the two leads in the film. He brings to life a poignant and intricately designed character, a man deeply entwined in physical and mental voids but trapped in a soul tormented by the hollowness of life. He captivates through his masterful touch of sensitive dexterity to the isolated intricacies of mourning and how one arrives at the methods used in loss.
Naomi Watts as Karen Moreno
In the film, naomi watts plays the role of Karen, a gentle and warm-hearted employee. She has a simple working relationship with Davis but helps him form a new and positive self-image. Watts’s character Davis’s transformation. She adds an element of positivity to the film and helps to drive the overall plot.
Chris Cooper as Phil Eastwood
Chris Cooper adds an array of emotions to the film through his character. Phil was not only a father in law to Davis but was also his boss which added an interesting parent and child dynamic to the character and their relationship. He was mourning the loss of his daughter also which was another emotion added to this character.
Judah Lewis as Chris Moreno
Judah Lewis plays Chris, son of Karen Moreno. Like Chris’ rebellious spirit, there is also the emergence of a sensitive and insightful boy. An unlikely bond is formed between Chris and Davis, enabling both to help one another in coping with their own issues.
Crew
Director: Jean-Marc Vallee
Vallée is known for his emotionally driven productions, including Dallas Buyers Club and Wild. In Demolition, the author is weaving in his special touch around the visual and pacing of the story with Demolition and utilizing the symbols to help the audience walk through the change Davis undergoes within himself.
Writer: Bryan Sipe
From the philosophic screenplay of Bryan Sipe, one can indeed sense a reflective change which is the result of sullen silence. Sipe is able to showcase the genuine confusion and the disarray which grief can bring in one’s life, but there is always a mistress of light to bring modernity.
Producers: Trent Luckinbill, Thad Luckinbill, Molly Smith and rest
A thoughtful combination of the camera work blended with the moving music and the down to earth acting was deployed to bring forth the rough story to the audience, and thus, the production team was able to collect excellent members for the cast and crew.
Ratings and Reception
Demolition has an audience score of 7.0/10 on IMDb, indicative of reasonable audience approval. Many viewers found the film’s gracefulness refreshing, along with its method of dealing with grief. Rather than dramatizing the issues of loss and grief with an over onered emotionally charged narrative, the film undertakes a tacit and deep approach to emotional resolution.
A common quote while watching and critiquing the film was that “Jake “Gyllenhaal was a show stealer in this one” and that he ‘masterfully performed the masterpiece that is garrulous Davis calmly and exquisitely. The articulation was impenetrable and the scenes, along with the rest of the ensemble, emerged literate poetry.” The chemistry of the cast, mainly, the chemistry of Davis and Karen, and, Davis and Chris was marveled by many.
Some viewers just thought the film was ‘slow’ or ‘lacked a storyline,’ but, for the ones that ‘connected’ with the film, Demolition spoke ‘candidly and beautifully’ about self transformation. It resonated to a different extent with people who had either been through grief and had shifted their position in life in a way that encouraged self evaluation.
It may not challenge a big budget film but the film is appreciated by a set of audience who love story on character with deep emotions and a story that makes you think.
Conclusion
Demolition marks its place as a melancholic and deeply reflective film. It tackles the concepts of loss, reminiscence, and personal renewal. The lens of the protagonist, Davis Mitchell, showcases grief as a process untethered to convention. The film demonstrates that expectations of healing can be an unreliable metric — healing can be still, bizarre, and at times, necessitate deconstruction before new construction can take place.
The film Demolition, with its notable and illustrious characters – Jake Gyllenhaal being a standout, in addition to the captivating tale spun – manages to provide a relevant perception of the most difficult phases of one’s life, and how hope and optimism can be found in the unlikeliest of places.
Watch Free Movies on Fmovies