This Review Written Between 7:17 and 8:09
Today's review: 5 to 7.
5 to 7 sounded like it had a good hook, and even though I was slightly wary about the implications of said hook, I figured I’d give it a shot if for no other reason than to foray outside my usual genre haunts. The good news is, the movie mostly managed to be charming. The bad news is, I’d say it’s very much charming despite itself.
The main character of the story is Brian Bloom (Anton Yelchin), a twenty-four year old who lives in New York and is trying to make a living as a writer, though so far he’s only managed to paper his walls with rejection letters. One day, he notices a beautiful woman smoking outside a hotel and decides to go over to talk to her. They hit it off, and after meeting up at the hotel and chatting briefly a few more times, they finally go out on a date. The woman, Arielle (Bérénice Marlohe) then drops a bombshell; she’s actually married with two children. But she and her husband, a diplomat named Valéry Pierpont (Lambert Wilson) follow the French rules when it comes to taking lovers. Both of them are allowed to have them, but they can only be with their lovers at a certain designated time (the titular 5 to 7), and while they can invite their lovers to social functions, it all has to be done in a discreet manner. Brian is baffled by all this, but likes Arielle enough to go along with it. Over time, he meets Valéry, Valéry’s mistress Jane (Olivia Thirlby), and has the daunting task of introducing Arielle (and explaining the situation) to his parents (Glenn Close and Frank Langella). Somewhere in there, he finally sells a story. And it’s now, two-thirds of the way through the movie, that we actually get some real conflict.
One of the major weak points of this movie is that it becomes increasingly harder to suspend your disbelief. While I can absolutely believe there were rules for how to take and interact with lovers back in the day (I would be completely unsurprised if this popped up in a Napoleonic War movie), I really doubt people still follow them to this day. Not even if both halves of the couple are French, with their reputation of being great lovers. Then there’s the matter of money. We’re told that Arielle used to be a model and Valéry is a diplomat or at least works for one, so them being rich is acceptable. But that just really highlights how implausible Brian’s life seems to be. It’s been a longstanding tradition in Hollywood that characters live in places they shouldn’t be able to afford, and to the movie’s credit, Brian’s apartment does seem pretty small. But since we don’t see him having any sort of day job while he waits for his writing career to take off, I can’t help but wonder how he can afford to live in the very expensive New York City. Moving on from that, Brian’s parents take the revelation about his unusual romantic life far too calmly-the dad does talk about it, but it always comes across as muted griping, and the mom seems completely accepting of it because “She makes my son happy.” The thing that made my suspension of disbelief finally snap and make me conclude that this was some sort of wish-fulfillment, however, was the material surrounding Brian’s first successful story sale. He gets published by The New Yorker, receives a check for $6000, and then gets to be part of a big ceremony where the head of the magazine introduces all these talented new young writers that they’re publishing. I knew immediately that there was absolutely no way that a writer would get their first story published in The New Yorker; it’s far too prestigious for that. I was also skeptical that Brian would get such a huge amount of money for his story, especially as a first timer. In fact, I wound up looking it up; while The New Yorker does, in fact, pay $6000 or more for a story, they don’t take unsolicited stories, and I could find no evidence of any sort of ceremony for first time writers. Then again, Jane is (or at least works for) an editor, and we get the impression that Valéry wants to keep his wife happy by keeping her lover happy, so perhaps we’re supposed to read something into Brian’s sudden success. But since that possibility is never discussed (and certainly isn’t a source of conflict), perhaps not.
There are a fair few other negative talking points. For one thing, the movie often trends towards the pretentious. One of the very first lines of dialogue is a voiceover by Brian saying something like “The best writing you’ll find out there is on the benches at Central Park”, and then, throughout the movie, we get to see closeups of some of the plaques on the benches, that are often pithy little bon mots. While I can see how a writer could use those plaques as inspiration, calling the plaques themselves the best ever examples of writing is just the sort of thing you say when you’re either being sarcastic or are a bit full of yourself. The characters in this movie trend more towards the latter, with dialogue that no one ever uses in ordinary conversation and philosophical musing. For another thing, there’s that lack of conflict I mentioned. Since all the characters are accepting of the situation (even Brian’s dad in his own way), there’s no drama to be had from Brian and Arielle sneaking around to have their relationship, and Brian’s difficulty in selling a story is more like background flavor. It’s only in the last act that we get any sort of conflict, and even then, the whole thing winds up getting resolved in about fifteen minutes, annoying me for multiple reasons (two of which have to do with money again). A story has to have some sort of stakes if it wants to engage the audience, and this movie doesn’t really deliver.
Then there are the smaller, more petty complaints. Given the hints of culture clash we see between Arielle and Brian, I feel like their attraction should have been purely physical, rather than as serious as it apparently gets. It’s possible that we’re supposed to see Brian as an unreliable narrator, but that’s not the impression I get most of the time. A fair few of the scenes, especially the ones in the hotel where Brian and Arielle have their trysts, are distractingly backlit. And pettiest of all, I found Yelchin’s voice to be a bit whiny. Then again, I’ve only ever seen him as Chekov in the Star Trek movies, where he was putting on a deliberately fake Russian accent, so maybe I was just thrown by the lack of accent, or maybe he was putting on an accent here too. All I know is that it made some of the lines land extra flat.
Yet for all my complaining above, the movie is fairly pleasant to watch. I wouldn’t say Yelchin and Marlohe have great chemistry, but they’re enjoyable enough to watch, which is important given how much time we spend with them. The movie as a whole is pretty playful, and has a lot of elegance about it, though I suspect a large part of that last bit is the luxury porn we get in the form of the hotel and the glimpses of Arielle’s lifestyle. I’m not sure if any of that translated to actively enjoying myself while watching the movie, but I wasn’t impatiently waiting for it to be over, either. And it certainly generated a fair bit for me to talk about in this review…
Slight charm aside, it probably isn’t worth seeking this out. There’s far too much that’s implausible about it, and there’s a good chance you’ll find yourself skeptical, irritated, or both. There are much better movies out there to spend your time with that have the positive aspects with much fewer of the negative ones. Old Hollywood can be pretty good at light and breezy, for example…
5 to 7 sounded like it had a good hook, and even though I was slightly wary about the implications of said hook, I figured I’d give it a shot if for no other reason than to foray outside my usual genre haunts. The good news is, the movie mostly managed to be charming. The bad news is, I’d say it’s very much charming despite itself.
The main character of the story is Brian Bloom (Anton Yelchin), a twenty-four year old who lives in New York and is trying to make a living as a writer, though so far he’s only managed to paper his walls with rejection letters. One day, he notices a beautiful woman smoking outside a hotel and decides to go over to talk to her. They hit it off, and after meeting up at the hotel and chatting briefly a few more times, they finally go out on a date. The woman, Arielle (Bérénice Marlohe) then drops a bombshell; she’s actually married with two children. But she and her husband, a diplomat named Valéry Pierpont (Lambert Wilson) follow the French rules when it comes to taking lovers. Both of them are allowed to have them, but they can only be with their lovers at a certain designated time (the titular 5 to 7), and while they can invite their lovers to social functions, it all has to be done in a discreet manner. Brian is baffled by all this, but likes Arielle enough to go along with it. Over time, he meets Valéry, Valéry’s mistress Jane (Olivia Thirlby), and has the daunting task of introducing Arielle (and explaining the situation) to his parents (Glenn Close and Frank Langella). Somewhere in there, he finally sells a story. And it’s now, two-thirds of the way through the movie, that we actually get some real conflict.
One of the major weak points of this movie is that it becomes increasingly harder to suspend your disbelief. While I can absolutely believe there were rules for how to take and interact with lovers back in the day (I would be completely unsurprised if this popped up in a Napoleonic War movie), I really doubt people still follow them to this day. Not even if both halves of the couple are French, with their reputation of being great lovers. Then there’s the matter of money. We’re told that Arielle used to be a model and Valéry is a diplomat or at least works for one, so them being rich is acceptable. But that just really highlights how implausible Brian’s life seems to be. It’s been a longstanding tradition in Hollywood that characters live in places they shouldn’t be able to afford, and to the movie’s credit, Brian’s apartment does seem pretty small. But since we don’t see him having any sort of day job while he waits for his writing career to take off, I can’t help but wonder how he can afford to live in the very expensive New York City. Moving on from that, Brian’s parents take the revelation about his unusual romantic life far too calmly-the dad does talk about it, but it always comes across as muted griping, and the mom seems completely accepting of it because “She makes my son happy.” The thing that made my suspension of disbelief finally snap and make me conclude that this was some sort of wish-fulfillment, however, was the material surrounding Brian’s first successful story sale. He gets published by The New Yorker, receives a check for $6000, and then gets to be part of a big ceremony where the head of the magazine introduces all these talented new young writers that they’re publishing. I knew immediately that there was absolutely no way that a writer would get their first story published in The New Yorker; it’s far too prestigious for that. I was also skeptical that Brian would get such a huge amount of money for his story, especially as a first timer. In fact, I wound up looking it up; while The New Yorker does, in fact, pay $6000 or more for a story, they don’t take unsolicited stories, and I could find no evidence of any sort of ceremony for first time writers. Then again, Jane is (or at least works for) an editor, and we get the impression that Valéry wants to keep his wife happy by keeping her lover happy, so perhaps we’re supposed to read something into Brian’s sudden success. But since that possibility is never discussed (and certainly isn’t a source of conflict), perhaps not.
There are a fair few other negative talking points. For one thing, the movie often trends towards the pretentious. One of the very first lines of dialogue is a voiceover by Brian saying something like “The best writing you’ll find out there is on the benches at Central Park”, and then, throughout the movie, we get to see closeups of some of the plaques on the benches, that are often pithy little bon mots. While I can see how a writer could use those plaques as inspiration, calling the plaques themselves the best ever examples of writing is just the sort of thing you say when you’re either being sarcastic or are a bit full of yourself. The characters in this movie trend more towards the latter, with dialogue that no one ever uses in ordinary conversation and philosophical musing. For another thing, there’s that lack of conflict I mentioned. Since all the characters are accepting of the situation (even Brian’s dad in his own way), there’s no drama to be had from Brian and Arielle sneaking around to have their relationship, and Brian’s difficulty in selling a story is more like background flavor. It’s only in the last act that we get any sort of conflict, and even then, the whole thing winds up getting resolved in about fifteen minutes, annoying me for multiple reasons (two of which have to do with money again). A story has to have some sort of stakes if it wants to engage the audience, and this movie doesn’t really deliver.
Then there are the smaller, more petty complaints. Given the hints of culture clash we see between Arielle and Brian, I feel like their attraction should have been purely physical, rather than as serious as it apparently gets. It’s possible that we’re supposed to see Brian as an unreliable narrator, but that’s not the impression I get most of the time. A fair few of the scenes, especially the ones in the hotel where Brian and Arielle have their trysts, are distractingly backlit. And pettiest of all, I found Yelchin’s voice to be a bit whiny. Then again, I’ve only ever seen him as Chekov in the Star Trek movies, where he was putting on a deliberately fake Russian accent, so maybe I was just thrown by the lack of accent, or maybe he was putting on an accent here too. All I know is that it made some of the lines land extra flat.
Yet for all my complaining above, the movie is fairly pleasant to watch. I wouldn’t say Yelchin and Marlohe have great chemistry, but they’re enjoyable enough to watch, which is important given how much time we spend with them. The movie as a whole is pretty playful, and has a lot of elegance about it, though I suspect a large part of that last bit is the luxury porn we get in the form of the hotel and the glimpses of Arielle’s lifestyle. I’m not sure if any of that translated to actively enjoying myself while watching the movie, but I wasn’t impatiently waiting for it to be over, either. And it certainly generated a fair bit for me to talk about in this review…
Slight charm aside, it probably isn’t worth seeking this out. There’s far too much that’s implausible about it, and there’s a good chance you’ll find yourself skeptical, irritated, or both. There are much better movies out there to spend your time with that have the positive aspects with much fewer of the negative ones. Old Hollywood can be pretty good at light and breezy, for example…