I Care a Lot- Review

By Nadia Ranaputri

Image credit: IMDB

Director: J. Blakeson
Cast: Rosamund Pike, Eiza González, Dianne Wiest, Peter Dinklage, Chris Messina, Isaiah Whitlock Jr., Alicia Witt.

"There are two types of people in this world: the people who take and those getting took. Predators and prey, lion and lamb," a line that sets the stage for J. Blakeson's I Care a Lot fairly well. Just from that monologue, you can tell you're about to get a face to face with the predator herself. Honestly, I didn't really know what to expect out of a film like this, but the prospect of seeing Rosamund Pike in another fierce role is enough to convince me. And in the opening monologue, she's more than fierce, but condescending and menacing, like she's spitting out her defense of her vile actions in a way that sounds calm from the outside, yet it's filled with a bitter kind of mirth.  "I've been poor," she charges on, "it doesn't agree with me."

I Care a Lot is about con-woman Marla Grayson (Rosamund Pike), seen convincing a jury to keep an elderly under her care after the son of said elderly is unable to visit her in the nursing home that Marla so "generously" put her in. Being the con-artist that she is, Marla makes a living as the appointed guardian of the elderly under the guise that they are unable to live without assistance, then turns their lives into a living hell without them even knowing it by draining them of their own funds as they remain confined in the nursing homes, barely able to see their own families. With the help of her assistant and lover Fran (Eiza González), as well as a corrupt doctor, Karen Amos (Alicia Witt), who's willing to lie to do Marla's bidding, Marla practically has the world wrapped around her fingers. That is, until she encounters wealthy elder Jennifer Peterson (Dianne Wiest), who according to Dr. Amos, has no direct relative, making her an easy target for Marla. However, Jennifer isn't who she seems to be, and Marla soon realizes that meddling with Jennifer has dire consequences, particularly with her direct ties to a certain Mafia boss.

I Care a Lot starts off very promising. Besides all that stylized visuals, the first half plays out like a quiet thriller, which was for the most part, incredibly riveting and very entertaining, especially when Rosamund Pike is donning an Amy Dunne-esque character, just with more subtlety. Seeing her tear through the system and toying with it like it's her playground is more than enough to hook you in. We can all agree that Rosamund Pike kills it in almost every role, right? Gone Girl practically proved that Pike can really elevate a film when given the right role. For this film specifically, Pike's performance as Marla is what drove and carried the entire film. Even with the film's underwhelming opening monologue, she still manages to deliver those lines to perfection. Interestingly, it plays out a little like American Psycho, where Pike's Marla is somewhat of a Patrick Bateman clone, but without the murder. Still, Marla makes for an equally terrifying villain in the beginning, even with that steady demeanor that manages to sway most people into doing her bidding. But behind that facade, as we see later in a scene after she successfully convinces a judge to fulfill her devious request, there's also a slither of venom in her, the one that strikes hard, and quickly retreats as soon it attacks. By cloaking her malicious intentions behind sickly sweet words, Pike's delivery and performance makes her a character you'd love to hate.

Image credit: IMDB

I went into this film not knowing much about it, though I wouldn't say I had particularly high hopes. But surprisingly, it was sleek and a little clever for the first half of the film. So what does I Care a Lot have to say? Well, it portrays a dark side of capitalism, where to really make it in the land of dreams, you either become the predator or the prey. Of course, Marla fits into the role of the predator snugly like a glove, or "a fucking lioness" as she calls herself. The elderly sadly, are the poor helpless prey in her wicked scheme. To see them being hauled away to a nursing home against their own will, not knowing that their funds are being drained while they lose contact with the outside world and never seeing their loved ones again is quite the petrifying sight. When Pike's Marla comes through that door, all smug and smiles, striding in like a femme fatale, but with words as her weapon as opposed to actual weapons; it's over for them. That's what the the first half of the film (maybe the first 70 minutes to be more precise) is going for. Then it really ramps up when one of Marla's supposed victims turns the tables on her. It's here where the film really peaked, and to be honest, I was very intrigued to see how the film plays out, because when you're put in a position like Marla, how on earth are you going to make your way out of it? However, before the film could reach the top, that's when it faces a downward spiral.

Now, while the first half was all style and had plenty of good substance to work with, the second half is an entirely different film, but not in a good way. For some reason, it felt like it was pulling a complete reverse of films that tend to balance different genres and switch from one tone to another. But while many of those films succeeded, there are bound to be ones that don't, and unfortunately, I Care A Lot joins the latter. It started off great, then went downhill from there. When the first half established the story in this very stylish and entertaining way where you're eager to see what it's going to do next, the second half just diminished that and suddenly, it forgets what it sets out to do. The second half is absolutely ridiculous, and I spent most of that time wondering what the hell this film is trying to achieve. Think of the first half like Mean Girls, where, as Cady Heron says it, "all the fighting had to be sneaky," and that's exactly what it does. Then you have the second half, which I consider as the Mean Girls 2 of the bunch, where it throws a lot of the things that made the predecessor good in the first place and becomes something that it isn't. Now put that together into one whole film, and you have I Care a Lot. There's nothing wrong with a film that switches its initial tone entirely as it goes, it's just that there are plenty of films that did it a lot better than this. 

Image credit: IMDB

The most unfortunate thing is that it was going for the anti-hero type of story, which could have given it a whole other layer. When a film with anti-hero is done right, it could be magnificent, it challenges and questions the audiences' own moralities. But this? Not so much. While the character of Marla was well-established in the introduction, her characterization in the film's second half is all over the place, and everything that made her interesting in the first place was no longer there. Eventually, you're not as invested in her character as you were in the first hour or so. In fact, I was much more interested in Fran than I did with Marla, even though Fran had less to do in the story than her. It's such a missed opportunity, especially if you have freaking Rosamund Pike, as your lead (I'm putting it in bold to emphasize how much of a missed opportunity it is when an incredibly talented actress like Pike is wasted in a messily written role). Even Dianne Wiest was so underutilized that Charles Boyle from Brooklyn Nine-Nine would probably file a complaint to the screenwriter for not making the most of out of Wiest's character. Then there's Peter Dinklage and his mafia posse, and I'll leave it to a Helen Shaw's review at Vulture to describe them, which was that they "bobble weapons, hurl smoothies, and wear costumes so loud I apologized to my downstairs neighbor." That should probably tell you enough about their characters.

I think the best way to watch I Care a Lot is to...... not really care a lot. It sounds a little odd, but if you stopped caring about a lot of the things that happens in the film, it may just be much more enjoyable. Is it an ideal way? Not really. Based on my experience though, watching it for the second time without looking into it that much made it more enjoyable, but it's nothing to write home about. However silly the film gets, it's not a Transformers level turn-off-your-brain kind of film, at least you can see that there's still more care and effort put in to I Care a Lot in terms of story, visuals, and characters than a mindless Michael Bay action film. I'll give it its points for being somewhat unashamed of its wild and uncanny nature that it gives in the second half. While it's all over the place, and you can certainly enjoy all the eccentricities it has to offer; you're left wondering how it even got to that point. There's many ways you can take a malicious character like Marla, who you aren't really supposed to root for, and give her a compelling character development, yet the film opted to do anything but that. With the premise of a con-woman going head-to-head with her toughest case yet, it provided an already interesting conflict. Unfortunately, it results in a goofy, weird, and messy film that feels so emotionally distant, that any sign of empathy or investment you even had in the beginning are eventually thrown out the window by the time it ends.  

Image credit: IMDB

Stars: 2.8/5

I Care a Lot is available to watch on Netflix