Claire Danes has always been something of a mystery to me. In 1997, after "The Rainmaker," I was sure she was going to be the biggest star of her generation. This girl had it all: looks, intelligence and, above all else, a talent so immense I thought she was going to become one of the all-time greats. But Danes has languished for the past eight years, mainly because she has taken unadventurous parts in forgettable movies like "The Mod Squad" and "Brokedown Palace." I understand that acting in formula films is how actors pay the rent in Hollywood, but to me, it seemed as if somebody with Danes' talent should have been doing something better.
Well, eight years after her searing performance in "The Rainmaker," I am happy to report that Claire Danes has indeed done something better: it's called "Shopgirl," and she turns in a performance that is as close to perfection as anything I've seen in a long time.
The movie, directed by Anand Tucker ("Hilary and Jackie") and written by Steve Martin (from his novella), is a simple little film about Mirabelle Butterfield (Danes), a young artist living alone in Los Angeles who sells gloves at Saks to pay the bills. She lives a lonely life. This is not to say her life is bad, just lonely. She goes home at night to an empty apartment and tries, unsuccessfully, to coax her cat out from under her bed. It's usually a bad sign if your cat doesn't want anything to do with you.
Her time at Saks is just as lonely: the glove counter is a tiny island isolated from the main sales floor. Nobody ever seems to actually want to buy anything from her until one fateful day when a handsome older man shows up inquiring about some evening gloves. His name is Ray Porter (Martin, again) and along with being interested in the gloves, it's obvious to us that he's also quite interested in Mirabelle. And guys like Ray Porter usually get what they want. He makes small-talk with her — they discuss the relative merits of gray versus black evening gloves. He's smooth and charming, she's young and impressionable. Can you see where this is headed? When Mirabelle goes home that night, she finds a box out in front of her apartment. Inside the box are the gloves Ray purchased, along with a note that reads simply "Will you have dinner with me? From Ray Porter." Now that, my friends, is how you ask a girl out on a date.
Unfortunately for Ray, there is another man is Mirabelle's life, although it is hardly fair to call him a man. His name is Jeremy (played by Jason Schwartzman, "Rushmore") and he meets Mirabelle at one of L.A.'s innumerable coin-op laundries. Jeremy is one of "those guys": a clownish, infuriating, but somewhat charming man-child who is so remarkably clueless about all aspects of life (especially women) you are amazed that he can get by. We all know guys like Jeremy: he's your little brother, or your freshman-year roommate. Heck, he's everybody I know on the second floor of The Langdon. When he asks Mirabelle out, she agrees more out of surprise than genuine attraction. Their first date is a particularly painful experience. He rolls up to her house in his beat-up old Gremlin, honks the horn, waits for her to run out and then zooms off to Citywalk, where they sit outside a movie theatre until she agrees to spot him some money for his ticket. When they go back to her apartment, he awkwardly tries to invite himself in, only to be shut down. Shortly thereafter, he leaves town with a rock band and a backpack full of self-help books.
While Mirabelle's relationship with Jeremy understandably goes nowhere, things are moving along smoothly with Ray — he takes her places, buys her nice things and whispers sweet nothings in her ear. Their relationship however, is fatally flawed, because it's not so much based on love or genuine fascination, as much as it is convenience. Ray Porter is a man looking for a young woman to provide sex and Mirabelle fits the bill. Mirabelle needs somebody to comfort her, somebody who makes her feel special, and, for a while, that man is Ray Porter.
The performances and direction are top-notch. Tucker's direction is smooth and assured. Martin's script expands on the themes presented in his novella without losing the intimacy of his original text. Martin has never gotten enough credit as an actor, so hopefully this will be his coming-out party, as "Lost in Translation" was for Bill Murray. Martin brings the warmth and humanity to Ray Porter that were lacking in the novella. We don't hate Ray: we pity him because he just cannot absorb the fact that he has won the love of a woman like Mirabelle, and feels perfectly content keeping her at arm's length. Some of you may even identify with him. I know I did.
Danes is perfect as Mirabelle. It's not a showy performance: she conveys Mirabelle's essence not so much through dialogue, but through her glances. She's a wallflower who never quite realizes how perfect she is. Her parents are no help and she turns to Ray for the kind of comfort humans thrive on, but Ray is unwilling or unable to provide this. Her last hope, in the end, might be Jeremy, the goofball, but is he her last hope or her last choice? Like love, it all depends on your perspective.
Part of the special pleasure of "Shopgirl" is watching how the characters of Ray, Mirabelle and Jeremy change over the course of the film. In so many films, characters stay the same for the purpose of the plot — in "Shopgirl," the plot is built around the characters and not the other way around. As a screenwriter, Martin doesn't try to go for any major fireworks (except in the third act, which feels strangely disjointed and isolated from the rest of the movie), choosing instead to quietly observe how these characters are able to grow through their interactions with one another. That's love — that's life.
Grade: B
