auturgist

THE TRIP TO GREECE is a poignant and hilarious meditation on life -- art, family, friendship, history, success and struggles and aging, and death -- that follows formula. By now, audiences ought to be familiar with the central conceit of these "trip" films: comedian friends Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon spend a week traveling a location and dining together. In transit, and over courses, they wax philosophical and compete over comedy and their careers. Essentially, these films are about two men suffering their friendship with each other while life goes on around them -- there is always at least one important sub-plot happening back home that complicates their plans. That said, formulaic needn't imply stale, and this presumably final installment of the series is very self-aware, a fact which helps it justify itself. If you are unsold on these films, this isn't the one that will sell you, and if you are unfamiliar with them, I'd start with the original, obviously... but if you have enjoyed any of the previous trips, this one is also worth taking, as you can live vicariously through them in seeing some gorgeous sights and savory dishes, especially now.

I use the word "challenging" for lack of a better word. In many ways, there's nothing challenging at all about THE ASSISTANT: it's not a long film, clocking in under an hour and a half, and there's really not much plot to follow. The film follows a single day in the life of an assistant to an executive film producer, but that fact itself is the challenge: THE ASSISTANT is a soul-crushing film that exposes us to the thousand cuts endured daily by assistant Jane (Julia Garner, fantastic in the role).

Superficially, very little happens: coworkers occasionally take out their frustration on her when their delivered lunch order is incorrect, as though she prepared the food herself, or else they leave their dirty dishes in the employee kitchen for her to wash while she's standing at the sink, like she doesn't have more important things to do herself. She is occasionally berated by her boss for her missteps in dealing with his angry wife when she calls looking for him. She contemplates filing a complaint with Human Resources. None of this is particularly dramatic on its own. But pay attention: the devil is in the details and what they imply about her boss, her role working for him, and women in this industry.

This is a subtle film about abuse so flagrant that it's not only accepted, but joked about. And the questions it raises are not big questions about ethics or industry standards, so much as smaller, more personal questions like, "What does someone like Jane, who dreams of working in the film industry as a producer, do in the face of this reality?" and "How much can one person compromise to get what she wants out of what others call an opportunity?"

As to the answers, spoiler alert: that's for you to decide.