Hallmark sentimentality, passionate defenses of Bob Dylan's "Time Out of Mind" and horrific head traumas are thrown together in Dan Fogelman's "Life Itself ," a curious cocktail of a movie from the "This is Us" creator about all of life's highest highs and lowest lows across generations and continents. Fogelman has seemingly never met an extreme emotion he doesn't want to exploit, and "Life Itself" might be the apex of that guiding principle.
For a movie in which the phrase "unreliable narrator" is repeated at least a dozen times, "Life Itself" is incredibly easy to spoil and oddly difficult to tease. It starts over several times, it lies, it backtracks, it misleads and surprises all in service of trying to hammer in the thesis that "life is the unreliable narrator." Life may be unreliable, sure, but movies sure as heck don't have to be to prove the point and this cynical device does not serve the earnest story he's attempting to tell. Nor does all the head trauma.
If there is a beginning, it's with Will (Oscar Isaac) and Abby (Olivia Wilde), who are apart in the present, but not too long ago were married, living in New York, extremely pregnant and spending long mornings in bed cooing at each other under white linens and discussing that 1997 Dylan album. Will is doing so poorly with the separation that he's taken up screenwriting and berating baristas while pouring alcohol into his coffee at an hour when such behavior is generally frowned upon.
This image released by Amazon Pictures shows Olivia Wilde, left, and Oscar Isaac in a scene from "Life Itself." (Jon PackAmazon Pictures via AP)
He tells his therapist, Dr. Morris (Annette Bening), about Abby and how in love, or, more accurately, how obsessed he was with her. She's beautiful, nurturing, and will eat everything the sushi chef puts in front of her, "Even the uni." There are shades of "(500) Days of Summer" in this whole segment as they go from the fateful Halloween where they fell in love while dressed as Vincent Vega and Mia Wallace, back to Abby's tragic childhood and up to dinner with the in-laws (Mandy Patinkin and Jean Smart).
But then that part of the story ends, quite abruptly, and we're taken to Spain to meet some new people who are sort of cosmically linked to the New Yorkers. Spain is the stronger part of the movie, with a contained and compellingly written story of a simple farmer Javier (Sergio Peris-Mencheta), his wife Isabel (Laia Costa), their son and the wealthy farm owner and landlord, Mr. Saccione (a very good Antonio Banderas who has a heck of a monologue about his mother and the Italian man she married). Yet even this reads as a little false, a little foreign and a little too conveniently cute and folksy to be fully believed and embraced.
In fact, nothing much in "Life Itself" feels like life itself. It is too polished, too winking, too big and too much to be all that relatable, even with a cast as appealing as this. Plus, Fogelman makes the odd choice to make nearly everything look present day, despite the fact that the story takes us through multiple generations.
This image released by Amazon Pictures shows Olivia Wilde in a scene from "Life Itself." (Jon PackAmazon Pictures via AP)
As someone who has failed to be won over by "This is Us" and "Crazy, Stupid, Love," which Fogelman wrote, I had come to believe that his worldview was for some people and not for others. Now I think "Life Itself" might be the thing that unites us.
"Life Itself," an Amazon Studios release, is rated R by the Motion Picture Association of America for "sexual references, some violent images and brief drug use." Running time: 118 minutes. One and a half stars out of four.
MPAA Definition of R: Restricted. Under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian.
Follow AP Film Writer Lindsey Bahr on Twitter: www.twitter.com/ldbahr
WASHINGTON (AP) — Israel this week briefed Biden administration officials on a plan to evacuate Palestinian civilians ahead of a potential operation in the southern Gaza city of Rafah aimed at rooting out Hamas militants, according to U.S. officials familiar with the talks.
The officials, who were not authorized to comment publicly and requested anonymity to speak about the sensitive exchange, said that the plan detailed by the Israelis did not change the U.S. administration’s view that moving forward with an operation in Rafah would put too many innocent Palestinian civilians at risk.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed to carry out a military operation in Rafah despite warnings from President Joe Biden and other western officials that doing so would result in more civilian deaths and worsen an already dire humanitarian crisis.
The Biden administration has said there could be consequences for Israel should it move forward with the operation without a credible plan to safeguard civilians.
“Absent such a plan, we can’t support a major military operation going into Rafah because the damage it would do is beyond what’s acceptable,” U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said late Friday at the Sedona Forum, an event in Arizona hosted by the McCain Institute.
Some 1.5 million Palestinians have sheltered in the southern Gaza city as the territory has been ravaged by the war that began on Oct. 7 after Hamas militants attacked Israel, killing 1,200 people and taking about 250 hostages.
The United Nations humanitarian aid agency on Friday said that hundreds of thousands of people would be “at imminent risk of death” if Israel moves forward with the Rafah assault. The border city is a critical entry point for humanitarian aid and is filled with displaced Palestinians, many in densely packed tent camps.
The officials added that the evacuation plan that the Israelis briefed was not finalized and both sides agreed to keep discussing the matter.
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters on Friday that no “comprehensive” plan for a potential Rafah operation has been revealed by the Israelis to the White House. The operation, however, has been discussed during recent calls between Biden and Netanyahu as well as during recent virtual talks with top Israeli and U.S. national security officials.
“We want to make sure that those conversations continue because it is important to protect those Palestinian lives — those innocent lives,” Jean-Pierre said.
The revelation of Israel's continued push to carry out a Rafah operation came as CIA director William Burns arrived Friday in Egypt, where negotiators are trying to seal a cease-fire accord between Israel and Hamas.
Hamas is considering the latest proposal for a cease-fire and hostage release put forward by U.S., Egyptian and Qatari mediators, who are looking to avert the Rafah operation.
They have publicly pressed Hamas to accept the terms of the deal that would lead to an extended cease-fire and an exchange of Israeli hostages taken captive on Oct. 7 and Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails.
Hamas has said it will send a delegation to Cairo in the coming days for further discussions on the offer, though it has not specified when.
Israel, and its allies, have sought to increase pressure on Hamas on the hostage negotiation. Signaling that Israel continues to move forward with its planning for a Rafah operation could be a tactic to nudge the militants to finalize the deal.
Netanyahu said earlier this week that Israeli forces would enter Rafah, which Israel says is Hamas’ last stronghold, regardless of whether a truce-for-hostages deal is struck. His comments appeared to be meant to appease his nationalist governing partners, and it was not clear whether they would have any bearing on any emerging deal with Hamas.
Blinken visited the region, including Israel, this week and called the latest proposal “extraordinarily generous” and said “the time to act is now.”
In Arizona on Friday, Blinken repeated remarks he made earlier this week that "the only thing standing between the people of Gaza and a cease-fire is Hamas.”
The Chahine family prepares to bury two adults and five boys and girls under the age of 16 after an overnight Israeli strike in Rafah, southern Gaza Strip, Friday, May 3, 2024. An Israeli strike on the city of Rafah on the southern edge of the Gaza Strip killed several people, including children, hospital officials said Friday. (AP Photo/Ismael Abu Dayyah)
FILE - Palestinians line up for free food during the ongoing Israeli air and ground offensive on the Gaza Strip in Rafah, Jan. 9, 2024. A top U.N. official said Friday, May 3, 2024, that hard-hit northern Gaza was now in “full-blown famine" after more than six months of war between Israel and Hamas and severe Israeli restrictions on food deliveries to the Palestinian territory. (AP Photo/Hatem Ali, File)
Palestinians rescue a woman survived after the Israeli bombardment on a residential building of Abu Alenan family in Rafah, southern Gaza Strip, early Saturday, May 4, 2024. (AP Photo/Ismael Abu Dayyah)
President Joe Biden walks across the South Lawn of the White House as he talks with White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre Thursday, May 2, 2024, in Washington, after returning from a trip to North Carolina. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein)
