“All my life are motion pictures,” bemoans George Clooney’s growing old celebrity Jay Kelly, a confession that hints at one thing deeper, and sadly, one thing way more predictable. The movie comes from writer-director Noah Baumbach, the thoughts behind cultural gems like “Marriage Story” and “The Squid and the Whale,” but “Jay Kelly,” co-written with Emily Mortimer, feels shockingly inept. It’s a Hollywood story slathered in schmaltz, full with Adam Sandler taking part in a frazzled supervisor who calls everybody “pet” for causes that stay as unexplained as they’re unfunny.
What we get is a one-trick pony stretched into an unbearable slog about an A-lister reflecting on his profession and his failures as a father. Jay desires to make amends and be the considerate, loving dad he pretended to be on display. On paper, that’s materials Baumbach may spin into one thing knotty and compelling. As an alternative, “Jay Kelly” by no means finds a rhythm. It shuffles in a seize bag of half-baked character archetypes—Sandler’s wound-up supervisor, Laura Dern primarily reprising her “Marriage Story” lawyer, Stacy Keach because the impenetrable father determine—then ladles on celebrity-navel-gazing as an alternative of pulling again on the Lifetime-movie clichés. Billy Crudup even seems for a single, bewildering scene to accuse Jay of stealing his life earlier than the 2 instantly begin swinging fists. Who may’ve guessed?
The film plods alongside as Jay bounces from Los Angeles to Paris to Tuscany, with occasional flashbacks reminding us that he stumbled into stardom by being in the proper place on the proper time. The movie desires to disclose the vacancy of being a large movie star, however I’m pretty sure most individuals already perceive fame isn’t a non secular wonderland. All of it performs like private remedy for Clooney, which is nice for him, much less so for the viewers.
“Jay Kelly” juggles so many threads that none of them land: Jay’s guilt over being an absent father (he’s estranged from his eldest daughter, performed by Riley Keough); a pointless subplot involving Sandler and Dern; and a thankless position for Greta Gerwig as Sandler’s perpetually irritated spouse whose complete operate is to name and complain. In the meantime, Jay wanders round making an attempt to determine who his actual pals are and who’re simply cashing checks, however I by no means cared sufficient about anybody on display for the query to matter.
At the least the Italian countryside gives a nice distraction from the parade of random characters Jay meets whereas chasing down his teenage daughter on her European backpacking journey. The movie even halts for a weird detour the place a handbag is snatched on a practice and Jay, instantly channeling his Batman days, sprints via a wheat subject to catch the thief. Positive. Why not?
Clooney is completely high-quality doing the Clooney efficiency he’s finished for years, and Sandler turns in a softer, extra subdued model of himself. However the two large stars create an odd imbalance that the movie by no means resolves. Baumbach clearly desires this to be a two-hander, however the pairing by no means gels. Just a few scenes trace at a extra managed, much less chaotic model of this movie that may’ve labored, however any spark will get misplaced beneath the self-satirizing impulses—particularly when reveals like “The Studio” have already perfected this Hollywood-lampooning components.
Finally, “Jay Kelly” feels just like the type of overindulgent Oscar bait {that a} fictional studio exec may go to sleep to in a screening room. Once in a while, Clooney’s allure cuts via, however when you look previous the movie-star sheen, the movie reveals a hole core. For all its speak about sacrifice—skilled, private, or in any other case—“Jay Kelly” by no means makes you care concerning the journey, or the person taking it.
JAY KELLY streams on Netflix Friday, December fifth.