The thing about ensemble dramas is that we love them. Even when they're not great, we get pulled in by the talent and hope the movie works too. Tim Blake Nelson tries again here to be the writer and director of a sprawling film highlighting the interconnected nature of human life, and this time he assembles the cast to make it worth a watch. It's just too bad his work doesn't provide a better foundation for them.
It would seem that Anesthesia might concern a feeling of numbness in modern life, a sort of artificial coping mechanism to deal with the pains of our existence. To some extent, Nelson's film does explore those ideas. We have a philosophy professor (Sam Waterston) preparing for retirement and contemplating his life's work as he aims for purpose- or intent-driven behaviors and one of his students (Kristen Stewart) who harms herself. We have an alcoholic housewife (Gretchen Mol) and mother of two trying to be the picture-perfect school mom, though her husband (Corey Stoll) is having an affair somewhere in town. We have an intelligent but failed writer (Nelson himself) and his children who are all fighting different addictions while his wife confronts cancer. It's a messy ensemble, and the actors fir their parts perfectly, performing with conviction and passion.
But though they're all trying to anesthetize themselves, Nelson does the exact opposite for us, plucking our heartstrings with wild abandon and forcing us to feel every little sting. Uncomfortably funny but comically sad, the whole enterprise feels underbaked. Contrived at best, the plot feels like Crash but cheaper and simpler and with a thesaurus. Waxing philosophic at every turn, the film meanders with a nihilistic goal, as its various themes of coming of age, addiction, fatality, depression, purpose, fidelity, and of course DEATH get pounded into our ears. Waterston carries the real weight here along with Stewart, as they deliver lengthy, complex monologues about the pains and purposes of life.
While I ordinarily like this heavy, heady stuff, here there is so little dramatic meat to feast on that the monologues feel gimmicky and cruel, a cerebral venture without focus. It tries so hard to make us empathize with its characters, but ultimately the film doesn't let us know much about the characters beyond their spotlight moments of revelation. They quickly become archetypes, caricatures of experimental teens, troubled spouses, struggling addicts, and none of them stick in your mind once the credits start rolling. One character refers to an "echo chamber", and that is an unfortunate but apt description of this film.
IMDb: Anesthesia
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