Take This Waltz (2011) User Reviews (161)

You might not agree with what it has to say, but Polley has made a bold and impressive film

[Movie_Muse_Reviews · 8/10 · 26 December 2012]

Common terms associated with movies about infidelity would be "lust," "passion" and "betrayal," yet all those things are suspiciously absent from Sarah Polley's infidelity drama, "Take This Waltz." Her film is about as anti-soap opera as you can get — careful to avoid melodrama and dedicated to sidestepping any and all conventional depictions of adult relationships in film.

It seems odd to call Polley bold for showing it like it is, the way that she drags us through the head of her main character, Margot (Michelle Williams), who so undeniably loves her husband, Lou (Seth Rogen), yet cannot deny her feelings for Daniel (Luke Kirby), a man she meets while away for work who turns out to be her neighbor. However, when it comes to filmmaking, anything that deviates from Hollywood reality can make an audience uncomfortable, so it takes some guts to ignore that filmmaking impulse.

Consequently, a good chunk of viewers will be turned off or frustrated by "Take This Waltz," losing patience with the inaction of its characters and pulling their hair out over the tension oozing out of the most casual character interactions. Yes, "Take This Waltz" can be so uneventful that it verges on pointless, but in time Polley's intentions become very clear.

As Margot and Daniel get closer, they don't really get closer, and as Margot and Lou drift apart, they actually come off as in love as they've ever been. For much of the film, it's in Margot's head that the cheating is actually happening. Her thoughts and actions are not in sync and it becomes extremely difficult for us to find empathy for her because we feel as though she needs to act on her feelings, to either voice her displeasure to Lou or throw herself at Daniel. That's the Hollywood impulse calling.

Polley continues to resist, and as challenging as it becomes to watch at times, her film comes out better for sticking to its convictions. As she clearly intended, a switch flips in a scene in which Margot and Daniel ride an indoor Scrambler as "Video Killed the Radio Star" plays, an in the loopy chaos of the scene, we (and Margot) find a certain clarity in understanding what's going on between the main characters.

There's a definite phantasmagoria to Polley's style as well that while visually engaging contrasts a bit with what's otherwise such a nuanced, completely believable film. Several scenes play out like dream sequences, but we later can confirm they actually happened. She seems quite content to toy with our expectations and challenge what we think we know to be true about how love works.

You couldn't cast a better actress than Williams with a performance that's so hard to pull off. We only identify with Margot because we see her humanity, but it's tough to understand her and in some cases even like as a third-party observer of her story. Williams should be lauded for volunteering for this experiment and selling it as well as she does, especially when you consider that Kirby is a total unknown and Rogen is a poster child for modern comedy, for formulaic comedies that are such a far cry from "Take This Waltz."

The end of the movie is bound to bother a lot of people, while others will be intrigued at the choice and make peace with what Polley has to say because she frankly makes a good argument. Fidelity gets such a black-and-white portrayal in film and television, though maybe that's a societal thing because of its prominence in religious code. Nevertheless, she utilizes every tool at her disposal to present the gray area that we so quickly jump to deny and shudder to embrace.

It's tough to really enjoy a film that doesn't emotionally click, in which we don't feel with our hearts that things should've turned out how they did, but Polley has such a beautiful directorial style and conveys her intentions so clearly that "Take This Waltz" warrants a certain degree of respect for its bold yet so honest and impressively perceptive take on love.

~Steven C

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Polley and Williams Take Us on Quite a Precarious Dance

[EUyeshima · 8/10 · 14 July 2012]

Sarah Polley proves her impressive directorial and screen writing debut, 2006's "Away from Her" starring a luminous, Oscar-nominated Julie Christie as an Alzheimer's patient, was no fluke with this incisive look at a most inchoate love triangle. With a title taken from Leonard Cohen's cultish song, this clear-eyed yet melancholic 2012 drama once again showcases Polley's prodigious acumen in capturing the complexity of adult relationships without casting blame or judgment on the parties involved. The focal point of the triangle is 28-year-old Margot, an aspiring writer from Toronto on an assignment in Nova Scotia to write the copy for a travel brochure on historic Louisbourg. There she meets Daniel, also from Toronto where he is a struggling artist and a rickshaw driver. An attraction is almost immediate but not consummated. When they fly home on the same plane, Margot discovers he lives just across the street from her, which complicates matters since she's been married for five years to Lou, a cookbook author specializing in chicken dishes. Their marriage is comfortable, and their interactions reflect a lived-in familiarity marked by cute practical jokes and quirky riffs of humor.

But what Margot sees in Daniel is something that's been missing in her life, a sexual spark that excites her, even though she dares not act upon it since she really does love Lou in spite of his foibles - including a certain apathy about their relationship that he thinks is perfectly normal. She could see spending the rest of her life with Lou, but she wonders if he is her soul-mate or whether it's worth the risk to find out if Daniel is really the one. Blinded by desires she had yet to tap in her marriage, Margot knows if she acts upon those feelings, there will come some point where she'll have to make a hard decision between Lou and Daniel. Michelle Williams captures Margot's inner conflict with palpable empathy as you see her character expose her thoughts in moments of quiet in which she is the harshest judge of her actions. It's a shining performance which compares favorably to her evocative Marilyn Monroe in "My Week with Marilyn". There is a deliberate vagueness to the two men. As Daniel, Luke Kirby ("Mambo Italiano") manages to convey the lure of "the other man" without coming across as despicable even though it's clear he wants her from afar. At the same time, it's clear that Margot and Daniel have little in common, and they make you wonder how sustainable their relationship could be.

Seth Rogen does something surprising in this film – he acts. He still doesn't stray that far away from his shaggy-dog comic persona, but he realistically shows how Lou's contentment and impassivity bring Margot both lasting security and unresolvable fear and longing. Similarly, Sarah Silverman makes her few scenes count as Lou's plainspoken sister Geraldine, who is married with two kids and an alcoholic just out of rehab, especially when she tells Margot what she thinks of her ultimate decision. That Polley can coax such fine dramatic work from Rogen and Silverman is a credit to her growing confidence as a filmmaker. As a native Canadian, she also presents Toronto as a setting with its own unique identity (versus other directors who use it as a double for New York or Chicago), and her cinematographer Luc Montpellier brings a lushness to the images that adds to the intoxication Margot is feeling. There are still flaws – the ramshackle pace adds to an already lengthy 116-minute running time, and the climactic time-lapse montage feels out- of-place for a film that had tread so lightly before. Regardless, this film should play on a double bill with David Lean's "Brief Encounter" to show how mores have evolved about infidelity over seventy years. Whatever the outcome may be, the bottom line is that there are no easy answers.

Tastes Like Chicken

[ferguson-6 · 7/10 · 15 July 2012]

Greetings again from the darkness. We have watched Sarah Polley grow up on screen. She began as a 6 year old child actress and evolved into an indie film favorite. Now, she is finding her true voice as a film director ... and what a unique voice it is. In Away from Her (2009), she told the heartbreaking story of a husband's struggle with losing his beloved wife to Alzheimer's Disease. Now we get the story of Margot, who just can't seem to find happiness or fulfillment within the stability of marriage.

Margot is played exceedingly well by Michelle Williams. I would say that without the casting of Ms. Williams, this film would probably not have worked. There is something about her that prevents us from turning on her character when she veers from her loyal, if a bit lacking in passion, husband Lou (played by Seth Rogen). Williams and Rogen have the little things that a marriage needs ... a language until itself and the comfort of consistency. What Margot misses is the magic. She thinks she finds that in her neighbor Daniel, a rickshaw driver played by Luke Kirby. Daniel is the kind of guy that every guy inherently knows not to trust, yet women somehow fall for. He is a subtle and slow seducer. The kind that make it seem like everything is innocent ... right up until it isn't.

Margot has that most annoying of spousal traits: she expects everyday to be Disneyland. The best scene in the movie occurs when Lou's sister (a terrific Sarah Silverman) confronts Margot and tells her that life has a gap and that you will go crazy trying to fill it. It's a wonderfully insightful line from writer/director Polley. Of course, we understand that this is Margot's nature and she learns that sometimes broken things can't be fixed.

Another great scene occurs in the women's locker room after water aerobics. There is a juxtaposition between generations of older women and younger ones. We see the differences not only in physical bodies, but in the wisdom that comes with age. More brilliance from the script. The one scene that I thought crossed the line was the "martini" scene. I found it tasteless, vulgar and far more extreme than what was called for at the time. But that's a small complaint for an otherwise stellar script.

As terrific as Ms. Williams and Ms. Silverman are, I found Seth Rogen to be miscast and quite unbelievable as a focused cookbook writing guy who has pretty simple, yet quietly deep thoughts about how a marriage should work. Again, this didn't ruin the film for me, but I did find him distracting and quite an odd choice.

It's filmmakers like Sarah Polley that keep the movie business evolving. Her viewpoint and thoughts are unique and inspirational, and should lead to a long career as a meaningful writer/director. Oh, and the use of Leonard Cohen's "Take this Waltz" song fit right in over the credits.

A Tragedy of Character

[Chris_Pandolfi · 6/10 · 29 June 2012]

"Take This Waltz" is essentially the story of a woman who's always looking for something new to fill the perpetual void in her life. This means that, no matter how the movie ends, it will be tragic – or, to be as fair as possible, interpreted by many as tragic. It probably is, although my reading of it is somewhat different. It's more a tragedy of character than of circumstance; here's a woman who truly does believe that something is missing, despite the fact that she has been married for five years to the same man. One could make the argument that, personality wise, they have too little common ground to stand on. On the same token, one could also make the argument that, despite being somewhat dull and incommunicative, he's still an all-around decent guy who did nothing to drive her away. This is really more about her than it is about him.

Her name is Margot (Michelle Williams), a young freelance writer who lives in a suburb of Toronto with her husband, Lou (Seth Rogen), who's writing a cookbook devoted entirely to chicken recipes and spends much of his time sautéing drumsticks in the kitchen. While on vacation, she met an artist named Daniel (Luke Kirby) and instantly made a connection with him on the plane ride back. Upon their return, Margot is both pleased and horrified to learn that he lives directly across the street from her. She also learns that he doesn't share his art with the world and instead makes a living as a rickshaw driver. I admittedly know little about the money one can earn from pulling rickshaws, in the U.S. or in Canada, although it seems to me that that alone would be an inadequate source of income, especially when you're renting an entire house.

Over the next several weeks, Margot and Daniel engage in an emotional affair, one that always teeters on the brink of becoming physical. Meanwhile, we see Margot trying and sometimes succeeding at engaging Lou. Granted, their level of engagement is basically on par with a couple who has just begun dating; they play around, roughhouse, and tease each other in very teenage ways, like describing the ways in which their love for one another amounts to over the top acts of physical harm. (Lou: "I love you so much, I want to put your spleen through a meat grinder." Margot: "I love you so much, I want to inject your face with a curious combination of swine flu and Ebola.") When dining out on their anniversary, however, Lou finds that he cannot keep a conversation going because he has nothing to say. This doesn't bother him, seeing as he and Margot are married and already know everything about each other.

Part of the problem with this film is that writer/director Sarah Polley never quite has a fix on the Margot character, and therefore can't inspire us to invest in her at anything beyond an arm's length. We see that that she's torn between two men, that she thinks she knows what she wants, and that when she finally gets what she wants, she's doomed to once again feel restless and unfulfilled. What isn't really explored is the reasoning behind this mindset. The best we get is an incredibly vague and rather pretentious airplane speech about her fear of being afraid, about not wanting to be stuck between two destination points. The Daniel character, seemingly the perfect man, listens to her every word and will eventually make love to her verbally in a café. By that, I mean he will get her teary-eyed and giggly by delivering a speech that sounds like a cross between a passage from a romance novel and a scene from a porn movie.

While lacking at a narrative level, the film is superbly cast. Williams, that most understated of actresses, is at her usual best. Rogen is a very pleasant surprise in what is surely the most mature role of his career, surpassing "Funny People" in terms of dramatic poise. But the real standout is Sarah Silverman, who is woefully underutilized as Margot's alcoholic sister-in-law, Geraldine. Much has been made of the fact that one scene features her completely nude, and indeed, she does go commando in a gym shower along with a group of women with very real body types. Surely this must have been daring, but her dramatic range was what really impressed me; despite the fact that her character is always a heartbeat away from a relapse, she manages to find just the right balance between humor and seriousness.

Polley's handling of the material isn't quite successful, which is disappointing given how interesting certain aspects of the premise are. Infidelity, for example, is examined from a more feminine perspective, which is to say that it's seen less as a simplistic physical transgression and more as a complex emotional betrayal. This is innately more engaging because it requires the audience to really think about the situation, the characters, and the outcome. This isn't to say that there shouldn't at some point be an explanation of sorts, a reason for it having to be this way. The issue with "Take This Waltz" is that, so far as I can tell, no such explanation is given. We're left to wonder why it is a woman can feel so empty even if she has everything she could possibly want. This is dangerous territory. The more we wonder, the less inclined we are to sympathize.

-- Chris Pandolfi (www.atatheaternearyou.net)

In-between of Things

[camillesummercat · 7/10 · 8 March 2013]

'I'm afraid of being in-between of things.' That's a beautiful line quoted by Margo from a film called 'Take this waltz'. Attracted by the title which reminded me of Leonard Cohen's song which turned out to be the same source at the first place, also the cast especially Michelle Williams that I find quite special, special in a way that her appearance seems to be fragrant because of how she looks like. I somehow believed that the character resembles a lot with her in real life. We all know her divorced co-star husband Heath Ledger died of an overdose accident, and they have a daughter named Mathilda. After his death she somehow emerges into a characterized actress. You can see her playing depressed wife, Marilyn Monroe, and this confused in-house freelance writer not knowing what to write about. It's all very well chosen with her characters. When I see the way she read out the lines, in a naturally performed way, there's a kind of magic and it must be coming from all what she experienced. Of course every actor's acting style comes from their own life and experience. Yet Michelle has this very sincere attitude of not disguising what went through in her spiritually and physically. Her nudity is not difficult to be found. Although a mother to daughter, her figure remains like a maid, pure and simple. It seems like having a child brings her nothing but growth, growth of innocence and courage of showing the real self inside of her.

The film involves a freelance writer Margo who married to a cookbook author and they enjoyed leisure house life on a Portugal region in Toronto, Canada. The couple is happily engaged with their friends and natives. Parties are thrown every now and then. They sometimes argue, but generally leading a sweet and contented marriage till she encounters with a handsome guy at a tourism site. The magic connection drew on these two strangers. They both found each other very strangely familiar. And right at the first conversation they felt natural enough to joke each other and explain one's inner feelings. Together they make a couple of innocent child embarking on an intuitive sight of the world sparkling only in their eyes. It's fun and haunting, especially when it's found they're only neighbors across from street.

Yet the thrill of encounter only keeps in a very cautious way, which makes it all the more alluring. They interact in an extremely explicit and intimate verbal way to displace physical attraction. Imaginary stroking, kissing and intercourse touched their mind with fulfilled excitement. Every morning she followed him or vice versa to the beach, cafés and the swimming pool, where they swim like dolphins, getting near and dodging away. When he attempted to grab her ankle, the moment suddenly halted and she just left like that. She felt like the spell will be broken once the intimacy takes off to a further step. And she's still guarding herself from the fear of casting herself in the craziness of love affair.

When you just need to get Leonard Cohen stuck in your head

[wandereramor · 9/10 · 23 February 2013]

This film shouldn't work nearly as well as it does. Take This Waltz centres around a two-suitors plot that was tired a century ago, takes place in a hipster-utopia version of Toronto, has multiple comedic actors who've worn out their welcome doing Serious Roles, and its characters are either selfish or dull. But Take This Waltz also has a kind of magic that can wash over the most jaded cinema viewer and make you forget that you've seen it all before.

Maybe it's Sarah Polley's direction, or maybe it's the brilliant performance of Michelle Williams that makes her character likable against all odds. Maybe the thematic statement about the perils of looking for adventure and the need for constant romance is something that we need affirmed more often against the tide of romcoms and gooey melodramas. Maybe it's just that I really want to live in hipster- utopia-Toronto. But this film stuck with me for days afterwards, its scenes playing over and over in my mind, blotting out all the rest of the disposable entertainment. There are so many indelible images here: a public shower scene which plays pranks on the male gaze, that goofy but somehow powerful 360-degree-rotation montage, and of course the final scene, a coda that grants its central character and us along with her a moment of unmediated joy. And it's that joy that the film understands as being something we maybe have to pursue no matter what its cost. Michelle Williams' abashed smile gives us a taste of that adventure, and like the rest of the movie, it's damn hard to resist.

Luke Kirby not enough for Michelle Williams

[SnoopyStyle · 6/10 · 23 September 2013]

Margot (Michelle Williams) meets Daniel (Luke Kirby) on a plane ride home. They hit it off and then they realize that they are actually neighbors. She finds him intriguing and rethinks her bland marriage to Lou (Seth Rogen). Sarah Silverman plays Margot's friend Geraldine.

Writer/director Sarah Polley is trying to dive into the emotions of cheating. And it feels manufactured. There is something artificial about the attraction between Margot and Daniel. There is just not enough chemistry between the two. Seth Rogen puts in a nice piece of work. It helps that he has the most compelling scene in the movie. (water in the shower, I'll say no more) Michelle Williams has done this character before, and she does it well. She's the magnificent beauty who doesn't know herself. I have to put this down as a minor sophomore jinx for Sarah Polley after 'Away from Her'. Not too bad but I expect bigger and better things to come.

hauntingly real

[christinensbtt · 9/10 · 3 July 2012]

This movie was hauntingly real--subtle in its slow approach to the climax and it stays with you long after you have left the theater. All of the actors are wonderful and capturing the nuances of their characters. Sarah Polley does it again. The story, set in Toronto, captures the everyday life of Margot and Lou--and depicts their special relationship through the details of their special ways of communicating. It is not until the complexities of Margot's struggle between her love for Lou and her unyielding attraction to her neighbour, that you start to feel her personal struggle. The inevitable ending does not disappoint. Highly recommended.

Take two aspirin...

[rgcustomer · 6/10 · 10 November 2011]

OK it's not as bad as all that -- it is sort-of OK -- but I had to say it. I'm probably not the first.

This is basically a short film on infidelity, dragged out to a couple of hours. It's not terrible, but it's also not good.

The film has its good points, of course. I found the cinematography to be great, for example. Particularly the shots in and around water were very effective, and showcase the use of film to communicate without words. But the fact that I'm noticing the cinematography first tells you that the story isn't really there.

I thought the acting was believable. Everyone performed well in their roles, as far as I can tell. Seth, Luke, and Michelle were good choices for the triangle. That said, I am confused about casting not just one but two popular comedians against type. It made me question what I was supposed to be seeing. I'm not sure I figured it out.

For me I attribute the problems to editing and writing.

The story didn't provide anyone for me to root for, identify with, or even hate. I didn't really care for any of the characters. I like these actors, but I found these characters annoying to varying degrees, but not so annoying as to be detestable. I just didn't wish to spend any more time with any of them than I had to. Perhaps if I could recognize in them any motivation for their actions (or lack thereof) it might be different. I compare this with The Postman Always Rings Twice, where understandable things happen, and lead to a more satisfying (but too preachy-perfect) ending.

The long silences here are not deep and meaningful. They're just long. I figure the film could be cut by half an hour, and not lose much beyond silence or small talk. In fact, even the end could be lopped off. There were several points where I thought it was over, but it kept going. What's odd is that there are some scenes where random half-second cuts are made, music-video-style, but real cuts to speed it along aren't made. I'm certain you could cut another hour or so and turn it into a really great short. There's nothing wrong with that, if telling the story with emotion is the goal.

The tie-in to Leonard Cohen's song seemed forced. I cringed. When I think about that scene, it feels to me like someone decided we needed a cryptic song by a Canadian poet to name the film after. I don't feel that any of the characters in the film are devoted Leonard Cohen fans.

Overall, I wouldn't recommend this film, but neither would I say to avoid it. It will surely be on the The Movie Network (among others) in Canada, since they apparently helped pay for it. The best place to see it is therefore probably cable or satellite.

Mopey, Misguided, and Pointless

[Danusha_Goska · 1/10 · 22 January 2013]

Spoiler alert! This review will reveal the end of "Take This Waltz."

"Take This Waltz" tells the story of Margot, a chronically depressed woman who is in a nice, stable marriage to Lou, a nice, stable guy. Margot meets, by chance, Daniel, a man who is slimmer, poorer, more artistic, and more conventionally handsome than her nice, stable husband. Don promises Margot hot experiences in bed. Margot leaves Lou for Dan.

In a montage sequence, Margot is shown having hot encounters with Dan, including three ways. Then Margot is shown being, again, chronically depressed. Margot implies that she regrets leaving Lou.

And that's it. That's the whole movie. It's not funny; it's not smart; it's not wonderful to look at. The direction, sets, costumes, dialogue, are all very not-special. The one powerful thing in the film is Michelle Williams' performance as Margot. Williams is a one woman storm front. Williams flutters and pouts and tears up and mopes with great gusto. Her performance totally overpowers anything else in the film, and it just starts feeling odd that someone is acting so hard in response to such a flimsy script in a film that isn't going anywhere.

Lou and Margot aren't believable as a stable, settled couple. Michelle Williams is too young and too attractive. You think – he married her for her looks; she married him because she was looking for a rock. Their marriage is awkward. They aren't shown supporting or enjoying each other. They are shown not connecting and letting each other down. You don't get the sense that Margot is sacrificing one good thing – intimacy and security – for another good thing – dangerous but thrilling encounters with the unknown. You get the sense that someone without much life experience or depth wrote this script very quickly and without input or rewrites.

The film throws in attempts to be artistic. Margot meets Dan at an open air museum where historical re-enactors whip a man accused of adultery. Margot is lectured by naked older women in a public shower: even new things get old. Lou is a cookbook author who writes only about chicken. The joke is, of course, that even exotic meats like snake are said to "taste like chicken." Exotic Dan will eventually bore Margot just as domestic Lou did. These attempts to be artistic just make the film desperate and pretentious, not deep.

The problem with the film is the problem with Margot. She is depressed; that is the central fact of her life. A dramatically arresting film about Margot would address her depression. She'd do what depressed people do – go to a shrink, try various medications, contemplate suicide, talk it out with friends. The film tries to be about the entropy of nice, stable relationships versus the appeal of the hot Bohemian stranger who promises an erotic candy shop of delights. That very interesting dilemma is not honored by the film. You don't look at Margot and think, "Appreciate what you have," or even, "Go for it!" You look at Margot and think "Prozac. Please. Or talk therapy or something. Or else this film is going to kill me with boredom."

Exploring the Gap

[mrcafemuse · 8/10 · 2 July 2012]

Take This Waltz Written and Directed by Sarah Polley Staring: Michelle Williams, Seth Rogen, Luke Kirby and Sarah Silverman

Reviewed by: Mitchell Rhodes

Take This Waltz debuted at the Toronto International Film Festival in September 2011, and I've been waiting to see it ever since. Finally, it's been released in Canada, and I saw it Friday, June 29 at the AMC Forum in Montreal.

In my opinion, Polley's breakthrough as an actor came in the Adam Egoyan film, The Sweet Hereafter (1997). Her directorial feature film debut, Away from Her (2006) received critical acclaim and many awards. I saw a screening of that film at the Vancouver International Film Festival with Polley inconspicuously standing at the back of theatre, presumably gauging the audience's reaction. She humbly accepted my congratulations at her effort and I've been a fan ever since.

Polley's sophomore directorial offering feels more like a first film because it plays as if it's deeply personal. She also brings Toronto to life with bright-saturated colours and beautiful street and beachfront settings.

The expressed theme of the film is exploring the gap—that potentially terrifying space between things, places, or more importantly commitment and relationships. This theme arises again and again throughout the film.

Whether it's between Geraldine's (Silverman) sobriety and drunkenness or Margot's (Williams) neurotic fear of changing planes between two connecting flights (requiring wheelchair assistance even though she's not disabled) or the anxious and confusing space that exists between the love of a husband, Lou (Rogen), and the love of a new potential romantic and erotic partner, Daniel (Kirby), we are always in the gap—never firmly on one side or the other.

Spoiler Alert #1

If I have one complaint about the film it's the shallow aspect of Lou, Margot's husband. Lou's devotion to chicken recipes (he's writing a cookbook) and his cutsy-wootsy routine both romantically and in the bedroom makes it all to easy to predict and then justify Margot's decision to leave him even though she remained sexually faithful up to that point.

Good writing/directing takes characters to the "end of their rope" and I'm not convinced that Polley takes Margot or Lou to such places. Perhaps it's Polley's real life divorce in 2008 that blocked her from doing so; letting this film play the way it felt for her rather than doing what best suited the characters in their circumstance. Polley vehemently denies any connection between this film and her real life and so we'll not stoop to speculative gossip here.

At a deeper philosophical level the film represents the pervasive human condition of union and separation expressed in the context of love—Oneness versus duality. Is love something you 'fall into,' if you are lucky, or does it take knowledge and effort? Is love simple, it's finding the right object (person) that's difficult? Or is love about faculty—an ability and capacity to love oneself and thus others as well?

As Margot is "falling in" love with Daniel, the object her love, a pivotal scene takes place on a Scrambler ride to the tune of Video Killed the Radio Star. The slow motion, the lights, the music, and the audience's point of view on the characters all create the impression of closing the gap. Then the ride abruptly ends. The music stops, the lights go up and in the faces of Margot and Daniel we see terror—a gap even bigger than before.

(Spoiler alert #2)

The film begins and ends with the same scene. It's with Daniel. Until this point, and without our knowing it, the entire film is a flash back. The audience has been in the gap with Margot along. And yet there is more. In the film's final scene we see Margot again on the Scrambler— this time she rides alone.

Is this scene is based in reality or is it Margot's fantasy or a daydream? Ultimately, that's not important. What's important is whether Margot has found the capacity to love herself and others. Or, is she back to where she began, where we began—in the gap? It's ambiguous and left for you to decide.

michelle williams phone it in

[jharrisonplease · 6/10 · 19 June 2012]

Michelle Williams seems to phone this one in...but her phoning it in is still twice as interesting and charming as what most actresses are capable of. The problem with this movie is that the it doesn't feel genuine or emotionally deep even though it's dealing with very thorny and adult concepts and themes. And the actors, all good in other films, disappoint in a big way here So the result is that the viewer feels a bit taken advantage of. The story is basically an early life crisis. Michelle Williams is torn between the men in her life and must choose. Cliché, yes, but let's face it...most people have gone through a similar situation. But she floats through it with so little feeling that its hard for us to feel either. On to the positive. The movie looks handsome, if a little bland, and has a nice hot summer feel to it. Seth Rogen proves once again that he can be a very solid dramatic actor when he needs to be. And even though the movie doesn't work, at least it tried to do something with emotional resonance.

Embarrassing and pretentious

[rafael105 · 3/10 · 11 July 2013]

Don't get me wrong, I like a 'chick movie', and I really wanted to like this one, since I am a big Michelle Williams fan. Having said that, this is a particularly bad specimen of bad female directing. The characters are all clichés. The camera work is painfully trite. The dialogs are stilted (especially the 'dirty talk' scene in the café, which is supposed to be sexy and is just embarrassing). The climactic scene, with the camera rotating around the bed while time passes, is one of the most pretentious pieces of movie-making since Oliver Stone thought he could be Francis Ford Coppola. This is like a self-help book laced with pseudo-feminist attitude and blown up to feature length. Proof that you really can be too cool for school and still fail to do anything worth bothering about. Voted most likely to be forgotten in ten years.

New gets old very quickly

[howard.schumann · 7/10 · 30 June 2012]

Unlike Wes Anderson's Moonrise Kingdom, a film that raises quirkiness to the level of art, Take This Waltz, the latest Indie film from Canadian director Sarah Polley (Away From Her), is over-constructed and contrived, obscuring whatever value its message may contain. Married to cookbook writer Lou (Seth Rogan), Margot (Michelle Williams), a prospective writer, shows no outward signs of being dissatisfied. Her relationship is filled with playful baby talk, tongue-in-cheek insults, and Lou's daily ritual of pouring cold water over Margot's head when she's taking a shower. When Margot meets Daniel (Luke Kirby) at Cape Breton's Fortress of Louisbourg, however, she begins to sense the emptiness in her marriage.

Unfortunately, several "chance encounters" at the outset strain credibility. Margot and Daniel just happen to be seated next to each other on the plane coming home and discover that they actually live right across the street. Margot tells Daniel that she's afraid of airports because she has "a problem making connections" (note the symbolism). Actually she says that she is just afraid of being afraid. Sounds like someone should have told her "You have nothing to fear but fear itself." We soon learn that Daniel is a bohemian artist who supports himself by driving a rickshaw (you heard right) on the streets of Toronto, while inexplicably living in a fancy loft in a middle class neighborhood.

We all know that his work must be very competitive because the streets of Toronto are just filled with rickshaws. Margot feels a sense of excitement that has been missing from her life, and, in the first throes of their attraction, they visit Toronto's Centre Island, and enjoy the Scrambler Ride to the pulsating rhythms of the 1979 hit "Video Killed the Radio Star" (a song repeated at the end in a different context). They also tease each other with descriptions of the sex they'd like to have, but never follow through and their relationship feels as ambivalent as that of Margot and Lou.

Margot is obviously looking for something but is so confused that she never stops to examine exactly what that something really is. There is no aliveness in any of the film's characters, with the possible exception of Lou's sister (Sarah Silverman), a recovering alcoholic who speaks her mind. The main protagonists never connect to anything outside of themselves and the dialogue is too glib to produce any genuine caring in the viewer. To its credit, however, Take This Waltz has style, excellent cinematography, wonderful music that includes an excellent tracking shot of the two lovers dancing to the Leonard Cohen song "Take This Waltz" and, of course, it has Michelle Williams.

Williams is terrific, as always, though here her character is drawn in such an uninteresting way that there is little humanity and emotion that we can relate to. Take This Waltz has a legitimate message about not being grounded in a stable and secure sense of self and some critics have hailed the film as an example of Margot's "voyage of self-discovery." The voyage, however, does not include talking about her relationship with her partner or with a marriage counselor, or even giving some thought to the vows and commitments she made. When Margot goes to a pool exercise class with some friends, they have a discussion of relationships in the showers. "New is shiny," says one of the women. "New gets old," someone interjects. New gets old very quickly in Take This Waltz.

Nuanced, fantastic performances

[Red_Identity · 27 May 2012]

Take This Waltz is a rather sweet, very nuanced film. Sarah Polley has some great talent in both screen writing and directing, and her effort here is... both a success and failure. It's a very gentle, very fragile film, one where all of the spoken dialogue is said with such precision and emotional truth and one in which the characters feel unwilling to reveal themselves completely. I appreciated it's tone, optimistic, but very melancholic. At times, it left me in a sort of trance. But it's not great simply because I found it too self-conscious at times. It has its great moments that ring true, but also moments in which it just feels like an exercise to be "sweet" and "subtle". The characters are not all as interesting as I would hope for. After the film's first act, I felt like the film had nowhere to go, and instead it kept going in circles. Still, it was involving for what it was.

The performances here are what is excellent. Although the characters do bring you into the story, they also really make you think twice about their flawed developments and overall writing. But the actors all give it their best. Michelle Williams is slowly becoming one of my favorite actresses, and while she is great in the role, I can't help but feel like it's something that she has already done in much more interesting ways. I love Williams, but I do hope that she starts to branch out in different ways and not just go for these type of roles. Rogen shows a real gracefulness and maturity that we haven't seen from him before, and he makes the most of his character definitely. Not a ground-breaking performance, but one that will make you appreciate him more as a dramatic actor. Kirby is also mysterious but also very appealing and seductive in his own way.

I would say that this is a failure in many ways, but also a film that I could still slightly recommend. I don't think it's anything original or even anything special, although it has its moments where it truly soars. I actually think that while Polley showed a different kind of directorial style, this is not as good as Away From Her. For Williams fans, check it out. She is great, but it feels like such an obvious role for her, and her performance, her mannerisms, all feel recycled. It leaves me torn because as an exercise in acting, she does more with the role than Polley did with her writing, but at the same time it can't hep but feel uninspired. The last 10 minutes however, are better than the rest of the film, and I do greatly admire what Polley did with this ending.

It's no tango...

[jakobstrunk · 6/10 · 9 July 2012]

Margot (Michelle Williams) is a writer for travel and amusement brochures. She meets Daniel (Luke Kirby) at a medieval-era recreation site. There is sexual tension from the start as he encourages her to whip (harder!) a shackled "prisoner" at a staged public humiliation.

As fate (or, the screenplay) would have it, they share an airplane row, a taxi cab, and a street address back home in Toronto. It's not until the moment their cab reaches her house that the flirting ends and Margot informs Daniel, suddenly and reluctantly, of her 5 year matrimony to Lou (Seth Rogen). As she watches him enter his house (literally across the street) she lets out a deep sigh. She can see the whole story to come, and knows how it will end.

Because, that is just the type of person Margot is. Devoid of any direction, dependent on sex-as-self esteem, and unconcerned with the lives and needs of others around her. We can all be like that, sometimes, however.

Her relationship with Lou is chummy. They play pranks on each other, wrestle, and express love with statements of hyperbolic violence ("I just got a new melon-baller and want to gouge your eyes out"). She wants passionate sex free of baby-talk, but he seems uninterested or unable. They're very settled in. He writes cook books and has mouthwatering chicken dishes in the oven every night. He's a decent man, treats her great and obviously loves her.

She makes a point of seeing Daniel, who paints well and pulls a rickshaw for money (judging by his apartment, he apparently makes an absolute killing) She starts leaving the house at the same time he does. He appears at her pool aerobics. They end up at a bar. He talks dirty to her. She's into it, but always leaves suddenly before anything physical can occur. She can't cheat. At least, not while she and Lou are together. She'll see what she can do about that.

Michele Williams is a superb actress. Some deep emotions and sticky themes manage to creep up from the shallow surface, but overall the tone is overly serious, petty and slight, much like the character of Margot herself.

Great

[sjanders-86430 · 10/10 · 20 October 2020]

Take A Waltz is a rare love story, because it doesn't answer any questions, but provokes discusion. When one is married to a really nice guy, that should be enough, but many times someone new explodes into the marriage. To act or not. To acknowlege new feelings or not. To wait or not. Here is action. Irrevocable action. That is the nuts and bolts of it. The script works because it provokes feelings and thought.

Take This Waltz

[CinemaSerf · 7/10 · 25 February 2023]

"Margot" (Michelle Williams) encounters the hunky "Daniel" (Luke Kirby) on a plane after he spots her using some interesting tactics to get onto the priority boarding list. They hit it off pretty quickly and on landing share a cab to their homes - it turns out that they are all but next door neighbours. Now she is very happily married to "Lou" (Seth Rogan) but I challenge anyone married or otherwise not to find the charismatic Kirby a bit of a distraction. Not looking for change, what now ensues is a gently evolving romance that shies away from sentimentality but focusses more on human nature. On how what isn't broken doesn't need fixed - but perhaps it needs changing? On the downside, there is a flaw in the marital relationship that isn't explained - and after a while I found that annoying, but for the most part this is a characterful study of people looking for happiness - even when they think they ready have it - and maybe even one that points out that it might never be truly attainable. Sarah Silverman contributes sparingly, but well, as the alcoholic sister-in-law ("Gerry") and though his is very much the lesser of the three leads, Rogan too offers us a considered performance as a man realising that his dreams are changing too - just not at his behest. It falls away a little at the end; the intensity of the performances cannot readily be sustained as it turns a little to the physical - plenty of full nudity but virtually none of "Daniel"! Its funny and quirky too, well written and for me, at any rate, one of Miss Williams' better on screen efforts.

A study in emotion

[Fludlerk · 8/10 · 11 September 2011]

I watched this film at it's premiere last night and found it quite entertaining and insightful. This was a film about the path that Margot's (Michelle Williams) emotions take as she struggles with the question of fulfilling the parts of her marriage that are missing through infidelity. Michelle gives a very inspiring performance as her character progresses....completely letting the audience in on every facet of her internal struggle and the toll it takes on her. There are times when you empathize and root for her, and times when you shake your head and wonder why she can't see what the audience sees.

Seth Rogen is surprisingly effective in his role as the geeky, but loving husband. I found myself constantly rooting for him. He did a great job of making his character imperfect but likable, but most importantly, believable.

Sarah Silverman delivered nicely in her role, especially near the end of the film. If there was a weak link, it was Luke Kirby, who never seemed to show much emotion at all, in a role where there was such potential for it.

Sarah Polley's writing and directing was excellent, although the pacing was at times a bit erratic. She managed to really capture what life is really like at times, without going over the top. By celebrating the little joys in life, she garnered sympathy for the main characters and the situations that developed, without forcing it. She also showed Toronto off very nicely, which was a bonus.

In all, if you're into character driven films, this is a very good one. The best part of it all, though, is Michelle Williams performance.

Very Toronto

[dingdong-63388 · 7/10 · 1 May 2022]

Not for everyone. What I liked about it was that it wasn't typical. I liked the warm colours and the narrow Toronto character homes. I liked the music. I liked, nay loved, the Scrambler ride on Centre Island and that entire scene.

Many reviewers rave about Michelle Williams's beauty. I thought she looked kind of messy and oily in this movie, but that could have been by plan. I also found, while her acting was good, her character didn't seem to have a lot to fall in love with, besides being really cute.

The movie showed the agony of longing, really well...all those charged moments when people are falling for one another and it's "forbidden"---in this case because Margot is Married to Lou and doesn't want to hurt him.

Some far fetched elements, like, If Daniel, the handsome newcomer on Margot's scene, is a rickshaw driver, not only how does he afford a decent spacious home across the street from Margot and Lou, but what does he do in the nasty Toronto winter months? We don't find out that much about him except that he's also an artist but too shy to try to exhibit his work (which seems odd as he's not a shy guy, pursuing Margot.) Similarly we find out that Margot, a travel writer, wants to be a real writer, presumably of fiction. But she doesn't share any profound or interesting thoughts, so perhaps she's better on the page than in person. And Lou, as played decently by Seth Rogen, is a cookbook author of entirely chicken recipes. And yet, only at the end of the movie do we see his new cookbook "Tastes Like Chicken" in a store window, indicating that this is his first book. They'd been married around five years, how have they been able to live comfortably all that time if he's only written the one book? And how does he develop his recipes in a small dimly lit kitchen?

Okay, Okay it's a movie, not everything is has to be completely believable but it's nice when it is. The emotions are believable, Michelle Williams' longing for Daniel seems real. The scene where Daniel ends up giving Lou and Margot a free ride in his rickshaw is wonderfully loaded.

I wondered about the sex scene towards the end, with the threesomes (other women in bed with Daniel and Margot) were they supposed to be real, or some kind of dream-like montage symbolic of something? I assume the former, as nothing else in the movie was supposed to be surreal like that. In which case, I have to wonder, why is Margot staying with Daniel if he's not that into her, if he needs more women in his bed? And since everything seems to make Margot cry, it seems she will never be happy and satisfied anyway. I certainly would get sick of her if I were either of the two guys hooked up with her in this movie. Still I came away from it feeling refreshed somehow, like I'd had a sorbet to cleanse me of the usual Hollywood stuff.

Sarah Silverman as Lou's sister is really wonderful. Funny and real.

Take this schmaltz

[akizora1 · 1/10 · 6 May 2013]

Ten minutes into the movie, Michelle Williams confides in her airplane seat mate, "I'm afraid of being afraid." It only goes downhill from there.

I don't know how the actors can deliver this horrendous dialogue without hating themselves. Even Sarah Silverman sucked in this movie. It does take a very special script and/or director to make her intolerable.

There are literally no redeeming factors in this movie. Every line, every character interaction, and every sex scene is cringe-worthy.

Sarah Polley, you owe me ten bucks and two hours of my life.

You May Make a Mistake if You Walk Out Half Way Through

[jwbeller · 8/10 · 14 July 2012]

I saw this movie at the Avalon Theater in Washington DC, which shows many independent films. A couple sitting across the aisle left about half way thru the movie and I could understand why. The first half is very slow and I would have been with them, but my wife always has to see a movie to the end. During the first half I was thinking the movie would be, at best, a 3 out of 10.

Watching the movie to conclusion was worth all the effort. However, I was left with a certain sadness for Margot (Michelle Williams) who really didn't know what she wanted, but knew there was something missing in her life and her marriage to Lou (Seth Rogen). Unlike some other reviewers, I believe Seth did a very credible acting job.

Sarah Silverman has been given praise for her work here. I'm a fan of hers and she does do a good job. But the credit for her work must be shared with Sarah Polley who wrote her some of the best lines in the movie.

I didn't particularly like Daniel (Luke Kirby) who in my opinion was emotionless. As the neighbor who Margot develops a lust for, he has many smart lines and does only a credible job.

Margot and Lou have been married for five years and the bloom is definitely off the rose. Although they are playful with each to try to cover for what's missing, they do not work together to make the marriage last. In fact, Lou is very happy with the way things are. They definitely have a problem with the kind of communication necessary to identify their problems and possible solutions.

Margot needed to become involved with outside activities that interested her to make her life fuller. She had too much idle time to think about what she was possibly missing.

A survey years ago of people with second marriages showed that at least a third said they should have worked harder to make their first marriage work. Margot should develop the capability to bring more to their marriage.

There is a sex scene late in the movie that was way over the top and would have been better if it was reduced to a long passionate kiss.

This movie is for serious movie buffs. I would not recommend it to the casual movie goer.

Good watch

[dbasuli · 7/10 · 20 December 2012]

This movie is all about Michelle Williams, and of course Sarah POlly, the director. Michelle has transcended herself and put her master card. The vulnerability of a woman, the subtle emotions, the dilemmas of thoughts..she has expressed it so nicely. Sarah Polly has been able to show her finesse in expressing the mystery of the woman's heart, love as an existential quest, not only for a security. With poignant images and great camera work (wow to the color tone), she has advanced the story in a very composed way. There is innovation in direction in little things (the silly games the couple play etc) and also in dealing with the main concept. The ending part also calls for appreciation, where the director shows that Michelle is still not happy after getting her love, and the images created to show the coldness in the relation is praiseworthy. Though there was a loss of the rhythm towards the end. The choice of the background soundtracks needs special mention.

Proves that Seth Rogan can act, but that's about it.

[MBunge · 4/10 · 6 July 2013]

Writer/director Sarah Polley makes things perfectly clear from the very beginning of Take This Waltz. As Michelle Williams and her feet shift in and out of focus while making blueberry muffins during the opening credits, I felt like Polley was speaking directly to me. She was saying "I have no interest in entertaining you. I made a film that satisfies my creative vision and if you enjoy it, great. If not, suck it".

I liked Polley's take on how the desire of the moment transforms into the reality of the rest of your life. Williams and Sarah Silverman get gratuitously naked, which is always welcome. Seth Rogan also demonstrates that he could be a pretty good dramatic actor if he worked at it. Everything else about this movie left me sucking it.

Margot (Williams) and Lou (Rogan) are a young married couple who are very much in love, but Lou no longer fulfills Margot's yearnings for passion and won't give her a child as compensation. Enter Daniel (Luke Kirby), a young artist/rickshaw driver who Margot meets and flirts with on a plane and then turns out to live right across the street. As Margot and Daniel slowly dance the dance of seduction around each other, the seams of Margot and Lou's marriage even more slowly split apart. Margot eventually leaves her husband and, in what is absolutely the best part of the story, we see that her "happily ever after" winds her up in exactly the same place she was before.

The montage where Polley shows us how the burning lust of soulmates turns inevitably into tedious domesticity is some great filmmaking. That sequence alone justifies her as an artist. Another montage where Rogan goes through 6 months of post-breakup emotions in one morning, however, shows that Polley has a long way to go as a craftsman. Take This Waltz is too long, too scattered and contains too much stuff that doesn't connect.

Take the Rogan montage, which could double as his screen test for any dramatic role for which he might ever audition. Rogan does a nice job handling the acting up to that scene, but the limits of his skill show through in the montage. What is obviously supposed to be a defining moment in the film falls flat and what makes it worse is that the montage is superfluous. There's no need to feature the character of Lou so prominently. This is overwhelmingly Margot's story. No other character really gets that kind of showcase moment against Lou and he already has a smaller bit that does everything necessary to tug on the audience's heart strings. The montage doesn't pay off anything we've seen of Lou leading up to it. It doesn't lead to any plot or character moments after it. It's isolated and arbitrary and may very well have been inserted into the script for the sole purpose of enticing a star like Rogan to take an otherwise meager part.

Another isolated and arbitrary scene is where Williams, Silverman and other women of various ages and shapes are showering together in a locker room. They're completely naked and there's nothing comedic or titillating about any of it. Polley is clearly trying to make some kind of statement about women's body types and the exploitation of female nudity in cinema. That statement has nothing whatsoever to do with anything else in Take This Waltz. The dialog from the scene could have been spoken in any other setting and neither female body issues nor meta-textual commentary of film are even vaguely alluded to in the rest of the motion picture.

And while Polley does a good job at making Margot and Lou into reasonably believable human beings, Daniel is a construct. He has no thoughts, emotions or existence beyond serving the plot. Additionally, there's a subplot about Silverman's character being an alcoholic where Polley doesn't appear to understand the difference between being a drunk and having a mental illness, like bipolar disorder. Either that or alcoholism is simply illegal in Canada.

Take This Waltz isn't a disaster. It did need someone to step in and persuade Polley to make it as a 40 minute long film festival entry. That didn't happen so I'd advise all but the most devoted lover of art house flicks to wait for the next dance.

A young woman who 'fears being afraid' struggles with growing up.

[TxMike · 12 November 2012]

I have become a Sarah Polley fan, actually have been one for a while. So in a movie like this I don't so much try to 'rate' it but to understand what she is trying to say and appreciate it.

Filmed in Polley's home country Canada, Michelle Williams is Margot, married for almost 5 years. When we see her interact with her husband I am struck by how child-like she is. They make silly faces at each other, say stupid things, but never really talk about anything of substance. It is this immaturity which is the subject of this character study.

I rarely like Seth Rogen but here is is very good in what for him is a serious role. He is Margot's husband Lou, and he is in the process of perfecting recipes to write his chicken cookbook. They seem to love each other very much, but at times he doesn't understand Margot's moodiness.

One day Margot is traveling back home from a trip and quite by accident is seated in the same row as Luke Kirby, an artist and rickshaw operator, Daniel. They share a cab and find out they live virtually across the street from each other. That isn't necessarily a problem but Margot finds herself attracted to Daniel.

So the story combines two familiar themes, how random incidents can have great influences on our lives, and how a person can (or not) resist strong temptation that they know they should. For most of the movie's running time we see Margot and Daniel finding ways to be at the same place without actually conspiring to 'see' each other. Daniel we feel is very willing, he is single and carefree, but he also respects that Margot has a husband.

All in all a very well crafted and acted story, where not everything makes everyone happy at the end.

SPOILERS follow: Towards the end, after Daniel actually attends a party of sorts at their house, Margot awakens the next day to see him in a truck leaving, he is moving away. He left her a picture card of the lighthouse they were supposed to meet at on a certain date 40 years in the future. Not knowing what to do, she walks to the shore of the lake, he finds her there, she can no longer resist her urges, she leaves Lou and has a torrid romantic and sexual relationship with Daniel, as they occupy a new place. Lou finishes his cookbook, it is a success, and he seems to be doing fine when she shows up some time later. It appears that she has remorse for leaving Lou, and knows she will probably never find a man as good. But Lou has moved on, he tells her "Some things you do in life, they stick". Meaning he could never see Margot the same way he saw her before. Margot is growing up the hard way.