‘C’mon C’mon’ Review: The World Recording to Joaquin

Synopsis: “A radio journalist embarks on a cross-country trip with his young nephew.”

Sometimes recording your life is as simple as talking into a microphone. It doesn’t have to be pictures or a movie, it can just be sound bites of ideas, a train rolling by, or how your day went. The new A24 film, C’mon C’mon, directed by Mike Mills, captures just that, the audio of a life changed by circumstances and an unlikely friendship.

Joaquin Phoenix stars as, Johnny, a radio journalist who is capturing audio clips from children around the United States on what they think the future will look like. Johnny is met with a fork in the road when his sister, Viv, played by Gabby Hoffmann, asks him to come watch his nephew while she’s away. Johnny is a single man who has no idea how to take care of a nine year old but tries his hardest to navigate the odd landscape he finds himself in. While Viv handles a marital situation in Oakland, Johnny and Jesse embark across a few states to continue Johnny’s work. Both Uncle and Nephew find themselves in the midst of a new recording in their hearts that they’ll never stop listening to.

Mike Mills, director of Beginners and 20th Century Women, filmed C’mon C’mon in black and white perfection. It’s odd sometimes. Black and white captures so much more than color films at times, something more gritty and a bit surreal about it. Mills did an amazing job of making the entire movie feel very real. Joaquin of course is a powerhouse, not giving the audience any doubt for a second he’s an emotionally stunted man who’s finally opening up about his feelings, thanks to his nephew. It’s hard to explain but it almost felt voyeuristic at times, peeking in on the struggles
each person in the film goes through, although the circumstances are the same they all handle it differently.

Woody Norman, who played the young nephew Jesse, had great chemistry with Joaquin. You could see them essentially start to become friends slowly but surely. I don’t know if they shot this in
chronological order but it sure felt like it. You could tell the actors slowly became more comfortable with one another, warming up to their budding emotions in each frame. And I have to mention of course Scoot McNairy showing up as Paul, Viv’s husband. I always love seeing him and it was a nice surprise.

Out of all the things this film had going for it, the best part was the interviews with the kids Joaquin and the other actors conducted. Asking numerous kids from Detroit, New York and New Orleans about their ideas of the future, the answers given were heart breaking and beautiful. I think these were all real because there’s no way that level of intimacy could be captured through scripted dialogue. The kids interviews were definitely the highlight and I’m so glad those got to be captured on film.

C’mon C’mon was not a perfect film. It felt like a short film that got drawn out a little too long while filming and they thought might as well make a feature out of all that footage. I could feel myself starting to get annoyed with Jesse as the same scenarios played out more than once, like a joke told multiple times, losing chuckles with each presentation. It was charming though, my attention always on Joaquin’s ability to make you get lost in his character. But overall it was missing something.

Final Thoughts?

I was asking the screen, “c’mon c’mon, give me something” throughout the film. There were times when I felt like I was about to get to the top of the rollercoaster but just ended up sliding back. And even as the credits rolled we never made it over the first big fall. This was a short film that was given a feature presentation. It had redeeming highlights throughout but overall it didn’t really give me anything more when I said, “come on”.