50/50

Rated R (for language throughout, sexual content and some drug use).  

 

Hollywood and Cancer often do not mix well. I remember. I see old photos of Ali McGraw and Ryan O’Neal together and I get bilious. To me Love Story was a horror film. And that is frequently the rule. Somebody gets a deadly disease, cue the sappy melodrama, and commence to wailing! After the credits roll, I feel violated.

Adam (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) is a young writer for a public radio station in Seattle, Washington. He is a nice guy. He doesn’t smoke or drink; he even recycles. He has some back pain and has night sweats. He goes in for tests and is told by a soulless and nasty automaton in a doctor’s lab coat that he has Cancer. His cruel explanation helps Adam not at all. He checks the Internet and learns that his chance of survival is 50/50.

Adam’s best friend is a foul mouthed, crude, usually obnoxious yet still loveable lout named Kyle (Seth Rogen). He is horrified that his pal has a deadly disease. On the other hand, once he regains his bearings, advises Adam that he can use his Cancer to get women in his bed. Kyle hates Adam’s passionless girlfriend, Rachel (Bryce Dallas Howard), and is eager for his faithful, honorable pal to kick the you-know-what to the curb. Of course, he eventually succeeds.

As part of his treatment, he gets chemo-therapy and meets two fellow patients: Alan (Philip Baker Hall) and Mitch (Matt Frewer) and goes to a therapist, a young woman who seems barely old enough to have a glass of Pinot Noir much less help him with a potentially terminal illness.

50/50 is low-key and mercifully absent of overtly melodramatic pathos. Yes, there are some moments that cause sniffles and tissue-dabbing but there are plenty of laughs too…often of an adult nature. It is touching, to be sure. And best of all, there is no gooey pathos-laden speech expressing — poetically — the meaning of love or friendship; just a guy going through the indignity of Cancer.

Adam has a very emotional mother (Anjelica Huston) and a father who is a victim of Alzheimer’s. Their relationship has its own evolution due to his treatment and, oddly enough, his inability to drive.

50/50 is a film about relationships and this means that good acting is essential. And most of the actors play their role subtly…except for Seth Rogen. Rogen is still Rogen…but beneath his vulgarity you see his love for his buddy.

The screenwriter of 50/50 is Will Reiser who learned he had Cancer at 24. His good friend, Seth Rogen (yes, the same Seth Rogen), helped him through his struggle. And so, 50/50 is a touching, personal film that is both modest and believable. It is not a masterpiece; it is just a deft tale of one man’s experience with Cancer.

50/50 works because it avoids the Lifetime Channel treatment. Although it is hardly a sitcom, it comes close. It balances the sadness with humor…but there is no laugh track, no pratfalls, and no cheap attempts at vomit gags.

Joseph Gordon-Levitt is the talent that makes 50/50 better than a so-so film. His light touch to the role, his Everyman manner, and his low-key style makes his character somebody we recognize and with whom we emphasize. He could be our best friend. After all, Adam, in Hebrew, means “Man.” So, I suppose, that means we too could be afflicted, suffer, and yet survive.

50/50 earns four and a half bow ties out of five.