Demolition (2015)

	Also Known As: -
	Year of first release: 2015
	Director: Jean-Marc Vallée
	Actors: Jake Gyllenhaal, Naomi Watts, Chris Cooper, Judah Lewis
	Country: USA
	Genre: Drama
	Conditions of visioning: 06.06.2016, Schauburg, OV Sneak Preview, English version with German subtitles
Synopsis: Davis (Gyllenhaal), a successful investment banker, looses his wife in a car crash. Despite pressure from his father-in-law, Phil (Cooper), to pull it together, Davis continues to unravel. What starts as a complaint letter to a vending machine company turns into a series of letters revealing his own impressions of himself. Davis' letters catch the attention of customer service rep, Karen (Watts), and, amidst emotional and financial burdens of her own, the two form an unlikely connection. With the help of Karen and her son Chris (Lewis), Davis starts to recover his conscience, beginning with the demolition of the life he once knew.
Review: The story reminds me the book L'étranger by Albert Camus, where the story starts with the death of the main character's mother. The lack of affection to the mother in Camus's book is like the one to the wife in Demolition. The originality is to build a love or friendship story beyond that feelingless life. It is never clear which kind of feeling Gyllenhaal has in that movie. I had the impression, it is done as a kind of artistic exercise in which his role is to show feeling in his new life only. I was not convinced of the sense of this exercise but I recognise the good acting of Naomi Watts and Jake Gyllenhaal in their roles.  The fact of presenting a boy and an adult destroying a house has something very attractive to me because of the symbol for internal revolution in which two generations are involved. A few scenes are very expressive as well.
Rating: 4 /10