Rules Don’t Apply (2016) 20th Century Fox/Comedy-Drama RT: 126 minutes Rated PG-13 (sexual material including brief strong language, thematic elements, drug references) Director: Warren Beatty Screenplay: Warren Beatty Cinematography: Caleb Deschanel Release date: November 23, 2016 (US) Cast: Warren Beatty, Lily Collins, Alden Ehrenreich, Annette Bening, Matthew Broderick, Alec Baldwin, Haley Bennett, Candice Bergen, Dabney Coleman, Steve Coogan, Ed Harris, Megan Hilty, Oliver Platt, Martin Sheen, Paul Sorvino, Taissa Farmiga, Amy Madigan, Paul Schneider, Chace Crawford, Marshall Bell, Hart Bochner, Eileen Ryan, Ashley Hamilton, Patrick Fischler, Josh Casaubon, Ron Perkins, Michael Badalucco, Holmes Osborne, Peter Mackenzie, Louise Linton, Julio Oscar Mechoso. Box Office: $3.7M (US)
Rating: ***
After a 15-year absence, Warren Beatty is back with Rules Don’t Apply. His previous film, 2001’s rom-com fizzle Town & Country, is still regarded as one of the biggest box office flops of all time. It would nice if I could say Rules Don’t Apply was a return to greatness for writer-director-star Beatty but I can’t. Instead it’s merely a good movie which is still a huge improvement over his last screen outing, but nowhere near the level of excellence of 1981’s Reds.
Time for full disclosure. I’m writing this review on a Monday. Rules Don’t Apply came out the previous Wednesday. Over the five-day Thanksgiving weekend, it grossed a paltry $2.1 million. That’s pretty bad especially when you factor in it opening on over 2300 screens. Why, its three-day (Fri-Sun) gross of $1.5 million puts it in sixth place on the Worst Wide Openings list. It beats Town & Country’s $3 million opening weekend on 2200 screens. Rules Don’t Apply really isn’t all that bad a movie. I liked it. But I do have some theories as to why it bombed so badly.
- Warren Beatty. He’s no longer relevant. At one point, he was one of Hollywood’s top stars with hits like Bonnie and Clyde (1967), McCabe & Mrs. Miller (1971), Shampoo (1975) and Heaven Can Wait (1978). His name no longer carries with it a guarantee for box office success. Even Bulworth, which was pretty good, only managed $29.2 million. What you have to realize is being an actor today is far different than it was in the 60s, 70s and 80s. The term “movie star” doesn’t mean the same thing to audiences of the social media age. Actors like Beatty are obsolete. Movie stars, as people of a certain age understand the term, are a thing of the past.
- The subject. Nobody under the age of 40 even remembers Howard Hughes. Myself, I’m barely old enough to remember the weird rich guy who was never seen in public. Oh, I’m sure young people know of Hughes but they have no conscious memory of when he was still alive. The only real frame of reference the under-40s have is……..
- The Aviator, the 2004 biopic directed by Martin Scorsese. Rules Don’t Apply is being marketed as a Hughes biopic, but it’s really not. The eccentric billionaire is merely a supporting player and doesn’t even show up until about 40-45 minutes into the movie. Beatty’s movie focuses on the relationship between two fictional people who worked for Hughes; driver Frank Forbes (Ehrenreich, Hail, Caesar!) and young starlet Marla Mabrey (Collins, The Blind Side). I’ll discuss that in more detail momentarily. The Aviator, which stars Leonardo DiCaprio as Hughes, trains its focus on the aviation magnate/film magnate’s early years as he struggles with crippling OCD. He wasn’t yet full-blown bat crap crazy. It’s a better film on many levels; Beatty’s ambitious movie suffers by comparison.
Okay, enough with the box office numbers and theories. Let’s talk about Rules Don’t Apply as a film. It opens in 1964 with the world anxiously waiting to see if the reclusive Hughes will make a phone call to members of the press in order to respond to certain claims made in a book written by somebody who says he knows the billionaire. It then cuts back to 1958 with Frank picking up Marla and her devoutly religious mother (Beatty’s wife Bening) at the airport. She’s one of many young aspiring actresses Hughes invited to Hollywood with the promise of a screen test. The only problem is that nobody has ever met the man or even seen him.
Eventually, Hughes summons Marla for a meeting which turns out to be a TV dinner and a bizarre conversation. That same night, he meets with Frank for the first time. After another rambling conversation, he reminds the young driver it’s forbidden for employees to have relationships with each other. Despite their differences- she’s Baptist, he’s Methodist- Frank and Marla start to fall for each other. Things become more complicated when Hughes asks Marla to be his wife so it will be harder for his enemies to have him committed to a mental hospital.
That’s really it in terms of plot. Rules Don’t Apply is a big, rambling, entertaining mess. At 126 minutes, it’s overlong. Also, the casting of big name actors like Martin Sheen, Alec Baldwin, Ed Harris and Candice Bergen in small, underdeveloped roles proves to be distracting. Beatty isn’t the first actor-turned-filmmaker guilty of such a excess. It looks good though. Beatty has an eye for period detail; he authentically recreates late 50s/early 60s Hollywood and Las Vegas, the film’s two primary settings. The costumes, cars, interiors and music give Rules Don’t Apply the feel of an old movie where the characters stand or sit around with cocktails and cigarettes. It just has the bad luck of being released the same weekend as Allied, another movie with an old school vibe.
Beatty, even though at 79 he’s twenty years older than Hughes was at the time, does a pretty good job. I never said he was a bad actor, he’s NOT! I, for one, am glad to see him back after such a long absence. I doubt millennials even care. That is, unless they have fond memories of seeing 1990’s Dick Tracy as a child. I have yet to hear any nostalgia about that one. That leaves the two actual leads, Ehrenreich and Collins. They’re both very good. Collins imbues her character with equal parts grace and grit. She’s a lady AND a tough cookie. She knows what she wants and isn’t afraid to speak her mind. Ehrenreich turns in solid work as an ambitious sort who’s been waiting to talk to Hughes about a business deal. He and fellow driver Levar (Broderick, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off) want to buy a plot of land and build a housing development.
Rules Don’t Apply is very watchable. It drags a bit here and there but so do most of Beatty’s movies. But it’s consistently interesting so we can overlook the pacing issues. Overall, it’s a good movie. It just looks like it won’t be the comeback film Beatty’s fans want. It’s not likely to make him a superstar again. Here’s hoping the next one is better AND we don’t have to wait another 15 years.
