The Land of Steady Habits is a 2018 comedy/drama about a man, feeling trapped in the stifling, wealthy enclave of Westport, Connecticut, who retires from his job in finance and leaves his wife in the hopes that it will renew his lust for life.
Capturing the doldrums of our simple existence and anyone’s attempts at escaping from it often makes for great entertainment, the mundane routine of our everyday spin on the big blue source for plenty of good hooks in cinema. Woody Allen was a master at twisting humor from the cloth while Noah Baumbach continues to make the complications of getting by endlessly fascinating. Now comes writer/director Nicole Holofcener‘s equally dark and funny entry, The Land of Steady Habits, based on a book by Ted Thompson, a film that fits comfortably in the mix, making for a very satisfying human drama with plenty of bite.
Deciding to give up everything that would by most standards seems a complete and successful life, Anders Hill (Ben Mendelsohn), leaves his career in finance and gets a divorce from his wife Helene (Edie Falco). Calling himself ‘retired,’ he begins anew, grappling with the process of starting over, bumbling through a series of sexual encounters with random women and trying to make his new condo look lived in. His mid-twenties son Preston (Thomas Mann) is also flailing, tethered to a crippling gambling addiction, drifting without any direction, while Anders himself can’t seem to fully extract himself from his relationship with Helene, who has since moved on with a new boyfriend (Bill Camp). Meanwhile, Anders entangles himself with Charlie (Charlie Tahan), the son of a former family friend, a drug addict who connects with the man’s unhappiness.
Right away, it’s great to see Mendelsohn take lead in a film that really gives him space to wallow. While he’s notable for a number of bad guy roles of late, he’s really very effective as a damaged man, scarred and burdened by terrible choices and urges to find a new path. As the title suggests, the film hinges on some heavy themes of addiction, where characters are bound to compulsive behaviors, leading to a string of broken people with Anders in the center of the spiral.
Mendelsohn is best at maintaining the balance, always keeping the humor very black while ensuring it feels surprisingly grounded. This is not a role of extremes, with Anders a man caught in the consequences of a singular choice that seems to have its weights hopelessly dragging him down as he desperately tries to decorate it as joyful. He is strapped to the anchors of his guilt, which continues to unravel him like a frayed spool of thread. Along the way, he meets a number of others that inspire comedy, including with Barbara (Connie Britton), a women he meets at a strip club (but not like how you’re thinking). Holofcener manages to make these moments ring with authenticity even as it leaves very little room for hope.
As a slice of life, The Land of Steady Habits is a bountiful well of terrific dramatic moments that don’t reach for extremes but do have impressive impact. Falco and Mendelsohn are very good together, the two never making these familiar characters onenote or expected, the corners these people find themselves in one’s we’ve seen before but handled with great care. We’re never quite sure who to root for and that’s why it works so well. This may be about steady habits but it’s much more about redefining them. Highly recommended.