St. Vincent

MOVIE TITLE: St. Vincent

DIRECTOR: Theodore Melfi

YEAR: 2014

GENRE: Dramatic Comedy

RATING: R for fight scenes, language, and sexual themes

GRADE: Pass

Vincent MacKenna is an angry old drunk with gambling problems, a prostitute girlfriend, and an addiction to cigarettes. And yet, he’s the only one who is available to baby-sit 12-year-old Oliver while his mother Maggie is working long hours at the hospital. Vincent seems like a highly unlikely candidate for a babysitting job. He takes Oliver to gamble at the race track, drink at the bar, and even teaches him how to fight back against Catholic school bullies. Behind all of the alcoholic rage, Vincent proves to be a worthy mentor for Oliver as the two teach each other valuable life lessons. There’s not one character in this movie who isn’t permanently changed for the better by the time the movie is over.

The first thing I’d like to touch on is the relationship between Oliver and his school bully Robert. These two get into plenty of fights during the beginning moments of the movie. But when the two of them are punished with toilet cleaning duty, they bonded over the fact that they both had scumbags for fathers. Normally when I talk about bullying in movies, I always wish a hardcore beating for the ones doing the bullying. While vengeance may seem nice during a moment of rage, diplomacy will always be a superior tactic. Violence begets more violence. Peace begets friendship. Oliver and Robert found their peace and become friends over time. This should count as a spoiler, but since it happens early enough in the movie, I don’t see how a warning is necessary.

The relationships between the characters and how they improve over time is heartwarming, but since this is a comedy, there should also be laughs to go with that warmth. The biggest source of comedy comes from Bill Murray’s performance as Vincent MacKenna. Mr. Murray portrays his character like a clumsy and foulmouthed degenerate. Whenever he’s cussing somebody out, making an off-color comment, or just being socially inept, the audience is laughing alongside him. He also employs a little bit of slapstick as well when he accidentally hits himself in the face with an ice hammer and knocks himself into unconsciousness. It’s brutal, but because Bill Murray is the one portraying it, he does a masterful job of turning brutality into giggles. Richard Roeper said Bill Murray might get an Oscar for this and I’m hard pressed to disagree with him.

The entire character roster of this film is flawed in some way. We like flawed characters, because they’re relatable and perfection is boring. If Vincent MacKenna was a heroic superman with a chiseled chin and a golden smile, this movie would be a snooze fest. If Oliver wasn’t a scrawny little dork, there’s be no reason for a bullying storyline, which is a huge part of the script. If Maggie wasn’t a struggling mother with all of these obstacles in her way, then she wouldn’t have a need to introduce Oliver to Vincent, which goes against the whole point of the story. Flaws in characters should be celebrated, because they make transformation that much more believable.

I first saw St. Vincent on my last day of a vacation to San Diego where Lego Land was the main reason for going. The reason for seeing this movie was to kill time before we had to hurry up and wait at the airport to go home. I must say that seeing this movie was the perfect way to end an already delightful vacation. I’m a sucker for a good story and St. Vincent has just that. A good movie puts me in a good mood, which is something everybody should have before they engage in stressful air travel. Because I was in a good mood, my flight back to Seattle went as smoothly as I could have asked for. Positivity attracts other positive things; never forget that proverb.