Late Fame (Kent Jones, 2025)
If Paterson was an appeal to the audience to pursue art (with a small a) as a way to give shape to a meaningless proletariat existence, Late Fame feels like its cruel sequel. What if Paterson were (re)discovered as capital A artist. And what might that mean for the art itself?
William Defoe gives a moving performance of a man who wakes up only to find himself in a dream he does not remember having. At the same time it seems like he’s unwittingly travelled forward in time and is aimlessly groping around to regain some sense of balance. My favourite minor performance of the year. That scene with Dafoe and his friends at the bar a highlight. Unfortunately, this feels stuck somewhere between portrait and satire. Jones seems more interested in making punchlines out of the nepo-baby gen-zs. While I fell for those easy laughs, it also made them forgettable memes. There’s a more caustic version of this and it reminds me of the earlier, better Baumbach films.
Greta Lee gives this her all, but what function does she serve apart from being some sort of a tragic temptress?