Digging for Fire

This is a movie about nothing. That's fine for a half-hour episode of Seinfeld, because it's amusing and entertaining. This movie is neither. It's humorless, tedious and somewhat painful to watch.

I like slice-of life movies. I don't need action. I don't need anything to really happen as long as I experience something I normally wouldn't experience in everyday life. This movie is anyone's very ordinary everyday life with some amount of coincidence and absurdity added. Rather than creating interest, though, these devices only prevent anything genuine from emerging.

Only one of the two main characters is believable, and both lack color and depth. That's a serious flaw in a movie where almost nothing happens. A transformation of sorts does take place, but it feels contrived. The events leading up to the transformation don't in any way suggest that it should occur, or why.

I'm giving the movie 4 out of 10 because someone might get something from it, and because there are a few brief moments that I liked. Also, the acting is at least adequate.The movie is inferior, but not horrible. Observing everyday life on a long walk would be a better way to spend 90 minutes, though.

I don't really like Joe Swanberg and his improvisational style, but I keep watching his movies because of the casts he assembles (plus they're usually super short and hardly painful or anything). There are a ton of good people in Digging for Fire (also Orlando Bloom), perhaps too many. Several have little to do. The plot here is borderline nonsensical, and, like the other Swanberg films I've seen, it doesn't amount to much in the end. Jake Johnson and Rosemarie DeWitt star as a married couple with a 3-year old. They have been asked to housesit for one of DeWitt's rich clients (I think she's a yoga instructor). While exploring, Johnson finds a gun and a bone half buried in the backyard. DeWitt immediately forbids Johnson from informing the police (as any normal human being would), and a second argument about their son's preschool sends her to the home of her parents (Judith Light and Sam Elliot). Meanwhile, Johnson throws a party (where Sam Rockwell, Mike Birbiglia, Anna Kendrick, Chris Messina and Brie Larson show up). He and Larson are intrigued by the mystery and start digging further. Later on, DeWitt will run into Orlando Bloom and both members of the couple are sexually tempted. The whole body in the backyard thing is just symbolism, but the police really ought to have been called.

I hadn't seen any other Joe Swanberg as pre-requisites but if I knew the delights Digging For Fire had in store for me I would have certainly done my research. However, that would have been some undertaking. He's one of the decade's most productive filmmakers, directing (as well as pulling his weight in all the other roles) a dozen films this decade, half of which in 2011 alone. While he barely gets towards the 80 minute mark and so does Digging For Fire, his mumblecore roots are growing in ambition into something else, a more cinematic mumblecore perhaps. With an all-star cast, wonderful score and attractive widescreen photography, it reflects that Los Angeles glisten that allures so many. But even with this shine, it relishes in an uncontrolled improvisational style which is its blessing and its curse. On one hand it feels more natural, slice-of-life and the chemistry between the actors glows, but then there's a real lack of structure within each scene and the themes aren't fully fleshed out, instead letting the film be deliberately limited.

However, that's part of its charm for me. In a way, it feels like a mini-Short Cuts, but rather than Altman's high drama and ambiguity, it keeps it low-key and on-the-nose at points. Same vibrancy and endearing everyday sense of humour though. I was more pleased that a film about long-term monogamy and maturing didn't go the distance and I preferred it as a mere tease. Despite that scale on a short runtime, the editing keeps it very brisk, so brisk that even 20 minutes from the end it doesn't feel like its momentum is going anywhere. I can see that complaint from many but it's at least a good time with good people, especially when we have Jake Johnson, Brie Larson, Sam Rockwell and Rosemarie DeWitt riffing in front of us. I also found it weirdly specifically relatable, as I was also housesitting in L.A. and its themes articulated some of my deeper anxieties. It doesn't investigate them, but it pried them up in a way I could see them bare. Digging For Fire never soars but it's consistently absorbing and amusing. Here's hoping Joe Swanberg does have a film in his future where he runs at it with a Paul Thomas Anderson-esque tenacity. Bring this cast for the ride too.

8/10

Rosemarie dewitt, jake johnson are lee and tim, who stay in a friend's house on a vacation. While there, tim finds a gun and a bone in the back yard dirt. And obsesses over digging up the yard to find more, with a bunch of loud, rowdy friends. Lee takes the kid and drives to her parents, which seems to be the beginning of a naughty night for her. Appearances by orlando bloom, sam rockwell, judith light, ron livingston, mike birbiglia. Tim does a whole lot of philosophizing, in between shovels of dirt. He doesn't seem capable of just plain small talk. Lots of scenes stapled together, but not much of a story. A clever scene when lee says "daddy is home, doing his homework"... cut to daddy, smoking a joint, as the camera pans past the tax forms. I'm guessing they won't be invited back to stay at this house! They dig up the yard, wear the owner's clothes, and break things. Terrible people. Directed by joe swanberg. Dewitt is married to livingston, probably best known for office space! He and johnson have appeared in other films directed by swanberg. Jude, the young boy also happens to be the director's son! It's a bit slow... needed more of a cohesive story. It could have been great.

Another chill Swanberg movie, where likable, real characters talk about life's problems, or talk around them (it's not mumblecore anymore I guess). This one is driven by maybe his most straight-forward storyline yet; ostensibly it's about re-kindling a marriage through both a literal and figurative "Digging For Fire."

A great cast, character-driven humor (who knew Orlando Bloom would be a fit in something like this?) and a coked up Sam Rockwell -- would someone please give this man a seriously great role?

I liked it quite a bit, like I like most of Swanberg's stuff, but I'm still waiting for that breakthrough experience from him. The kind of humanity and minor profundity of Linklater or someone like that.