Susan Granger’s review of “May – December” (Netflix)
Do you remember back in 1997 when the tabloids were filled with juicy tidbits about Mary Kay Letourneau, a married schoolteacher who had an affair with a seventh-grade student? Pregnant, she was sentenced to prison and, when she was released, they married and had two more children. Those are the facts.
Now filmmaker Todd Haynes has fabricated a story about what their lives might be like 20 years later – when a movie is going to be made about their relationship.
In order to portray the schoolteacher, ambitious TV actress Elizabeth Berry (Natalie Portman) decides to visit Gracie Atherton (Julianne Moore) and Joe Yoo (Charles Melton), who still live in Savannah, Georgia, surrounded by townsfolk who knew them ‘way back when the nationwide scandal erupted.
Elizabeth arrives at their spacious, waterfront home just as the family is preparing a barbecue to celebrate their two youngest children – twins – graduation from high school. Joe is now 36, the same age Gracie was when they embarked on their notorious liaison.
What’s bizarre is that – even now – Gracie doesn’t feel she ever did anything wrong. She’s in total denial as she relates how their intimate connection developed, rationalizing: “I was very sheltered and he matured very fast.”
Perhaps Gracie’s ex-husband Tom (D.W. Moffet) best verbalizes the obvious: “What would make a 36 year-old woman have an affair with a seventh grader?” That bewildering question is never answered.
Curiously, as manipulative Elizabeth spends more and more time shadowing Gracie, almost imperceptivity she begins to mirror her voice, manners and expressions. Natalie Portman’s voracious mimicry is what’s most memorable, as is Todd Haynes’ deft utilization of mirrors.
Working from a soapy script by Samy Burch, augmented by Marcelo Zarvos’ score, director Todd Haynes veers toward melodrama, as mild-mannered Korean-American Joe gradually comes to realize that he was not mature enough – back then – to make the kind of decisions that would shape the rest of his life. And during the intervening years, obliviously controlling Gracie has continued to infantilize him.
FYI: A May-December romance is one between two people with a considerable age difference. The months symbolize the seasons – with spring representing youth and winter designating old age.
On the Granger Gauge of 1 to 10, “May – December” is a sad, sordid 6, streaming on Netflix.
