“Dear Champion Vending Company: I put five quarters in your machine and proceeded to push B2, which should have given me peanut M&M’s. Regrettably, it did not. I found this upsetting, as I was very hungry, and also my wife had died ten minutes earlier.”
Davis (Jake Gyllenhaal) has come home from the hospital when he starts to write this letter. His wife Julia (Heather Lind) had been driving the car when it crashed. Davis was right next to her. She died while he survived with barely a scratch.
Davis is a successful investment banker who works for his father-in-law, Phil (Chris Cooper). Davis, by his own admission, has an easy job with those under him doing the heavy lifting. Davis has coasted through life, largely unchallenged. Things have fallen into place for him and his marriage to Julia was convenient.
Julia’s friends and family are grief stricken and mourn her death while Davis remains detached from his emotions. He feels nothing. Before he can even contemplate grief he has to truly connect with the world around him for the first time. This manifests as a sudden and insane curiosity for how things work. The fridge at home is leaking so he takes the whole thing apart. His computer at work throws up an error message so he dismantles it. He confronts strangers and his behaviour at work becomes increasingly bizarre. To outward appearance, Davis is clearly not dealing well with Julia’s death.
Davis writes several more letters to the customer services department of the Champion Vending Company. These become increasingly personal as Davis shares his innermost thoughts. Then late one night he gets a phone call… Karen (Naomi Watts) is deeply touched by what Davis has written and an unlikely friendship begins. Karen’s son is the antisocial and sexually confused Chris (Judah Lewis). So now with two allies, Davis continues his social experiment through thrill-seeking adventures.
Davis’ dissection, then examination and finally destruction of material things, is the process he needs to go through before he can rebuild his life. Yes, this is the film where a guy demolishes his own house, but Demolition is so much more than that. This film has been labelled as a comedy/drama. It is in part a light-hearted, feel-good romp that reminds us that life is for living. However, it is also a cogent study of grief and how it affects people in different ways.
Helped by a razor-sharp script, Jake Gyllenhaal is great. From the Kafkaesque alienation that Davis experiences at the start, to his sledgehammer social interactions, Gyllenhaal is in complete control. Naomi Watts is wonderful as single mum Karen. She looks at Davis with such intensity and care in her eyes, it feels effortlessly warm and real. Despite her personal challenges and emotional baggage, she is a friend anyone would want.
Karen describes her son as being fifteen years old, who looks like he’s twelve and acts as though he is twenty-one. This is a pretty accurate description of Judah Lewis, who is a revelation in this role. He possesses a restless magnetism beyond his years and shows great comic timing. Just watch the scene in the hardware store! Chris Cooper is convincing as the bereaved father and exasperated boss. This role depends on realism, as it is Phil that mostly shoulders the burden of grief in this film, while trying to fashion a fitting legacy to his daughter’s memory.
These days the original screenplay is a rare beast, as most movies are adaptations. Bryan Sipe’s original screenplay is simply brilliant and draws a lot from his own experiences. While an out of work screenwriter he worked as a demolition guy in New Jersey. The script is pared down to the minimum; no words are wasted and every line carries weight, it is both tragic and comic, with a hint of Samuel Beckett. In the original movie trailer for Demolition, Karen asks Davis, “Do you miss her?” to which he replies honestly, “I’m trying to.” His reply was omitted from the final released version of the film.
Director Jean-Marc Vallee has a talent for getting the very best out of his actors. His previous film Wild (2014) earned two Oscar acting nominations while Dallas Buyers Club (2013) won two acting Oscars. In Demolition there is no reason to doubt that he’s done it again.
Demolition is an unusual and clever film. It sparkles with wit while a man takes a wrecking ball to his life, but it is also an exploration of grief, friendship, and reconciliation.
You have probably guessed by now that I absolutely loved it. It is a deeper and wiser film than many have given it credit for and I would strongly recommend that you find out for yourself.
Author – Simon, Norwich store
