Sundance London: The Intervention review: Debut feature director Clea DuVall throws in a solid effort with this comedy drama, one of the highlights from this year’s touring festival.
The Intervention review by Paul Heath, June 2016.
The Intervention review
Actress Clea Duvall makes her feature directorial debut with this interesting, character-driven piece set in middle America about four couples, eight friends, who come together in Savannah for a weekend getaway.
There’s Annie (Melanie Lynskey) and Matt (Jason Ritter), two thirty-seomthings who are on the verge of taking that important next step by getting married, Annie the half of couple who keeps delaying the big day. There’s also Sarah (Natasha Lyonne) and Jessie (DuVall), and LA pair, one of whom wants total commitment while the other still craves her independence. Jack (Ben Schwartz) is still mourning he loss of his wife, though he’s hooked up with free spirit Lola (Alia Shawkat), a wild young girl perhaps a little too young for her current peer group, though perhaps the most grounded. They have all converged on a country house, which is stemmed with history to intervene on the martial partnership of Cobie Smulders‘ Rose and her husband Peter (Vincent Piazza). The wedded pair are clearly having issues as a couple when we’re introduced to them, bickering on their way to the their weekend getaway, Peter seemingly more married to his job rather than his wife and mother to his three young children. The film follows the highs and lows of this seemingly straight-forward weekend of friends helping out other friends in need… only which are the ones that need the help?
The Intervention review
Clea DuVall is probably best known for her work as a successful character actress, appearing in the likes of Girl, Interrupted to the TV series Heroes, American Horror Story, The Newsroom, and most recently Better Call Saul and Veep. As well as directing this indie wonder, DuVall also wrote the very well constructed screenplay, essentially a two-hour play largely set in one location, a sprawling country getaway in Savannah, Georgia.
The film, a comedy drama centring on the fallout when you throw a group of people together into one location, is entertaining throughout, the dialogue excellently written and executed, the actors’ great chemistry with one another not only entertaining, but essential. Clear stand-outs are Cobie Smulders as the clearly tormented ‘Hitler sympathiser’ Ruby, superbly places as the antagonist to her husband Peter, also delivered wonderfully by Piazza. DuVall herself is also wonderful to watch in her role as Jessie, the sexual intensity of her character superbly matched with that of Lyonne and Shawkat who very nearly succumb to a love split in a very entertaining scene when the foreboding bubble bursts halfway in.
The Intervention review
Throw in some superb cinematography from Polly Morgan, and brilliant editing from Tamara Meem, just two members of a creative team which, as you can tell, is refreshingly largely made up of female film-making talent, and you’ve got some great cinema.
A comedy about commitment, and indeed over-commitment, love and loss – something which we can see is becoming a bit of a theme in the selection of this year’s Sundance London. While not offering anything fresh, or indeed breaking any new ground, this is a solid, well thought-out debut from DuVall, an exciting filmmaker who we can’t wait to see what she’s going to deliver next. Definitely worth seeking out.
The Intervention review by Paul Heath, June 2016.
The Intervention will screen at Sundance London, 2016.
