Review by
Eric Hillis
Directed by: Cooper Raiff
Starring: Cooper Raiff, Dakota Johnson, Vanessa Burghardt, Leslie Mann, Brad Garrett, Raúl Castillo, Odeya Rush
Still in his mid-twenties, writer/director/star Cooper Raiff has
already established himself a distinctive screen persona in the two
feature films he's written, directed and starred in. His feature debut
Shithouse saw Raiff play a college freshman dogged with
homesickness whose heart is broken when the girl he spends a wonderful
night with proceeds to ignore him. His second feature,
Cha Cha Real Smooth, isn't a sequel to Shithouse, but it might well be, with Raiff playing a very similar character.
Once again he's essaying an innocent nice guy who can't understand why
we can't have nice things.
Here Raiff is Andrew, a 22-year-old stuck in limbo after finishing
college. He wants to join his girlfriend in Barcelona but needs to raise
the funds to join her there. This sees him taking a fast food job while
supplementing his income as a "party starter" for the never-ending bar
mitzvahs of his local Jewish community.
Raiff uses bar and bat mitzvahs the way Richard Curtis used weddings
and a funeral, with the narrative progressing a little more with each
function. It's at one such event that Andrew meets thirtysomething
single mother Domino (Dakota Johnson) and her teenage autistic
daughter Lola (Vanessa Burghardt). Impressed by Andrew's ability
to bring Lola out of her shell (unlike others, Andrew never infantilises
Lola), Domino hires him as a babysitter. When Andrew helps Domino with
what initially appears a simple "female issue" but is revealed to be far
more tragic, the two are brought together, initiating a "will they,
won’t they" narrative.
Andrew is completely smitten by Domino (as will you, the viewer), but
the older woman is engaged to be married to a lawyer, Joseph (Raúl Castillo), and though she admits that Andrew makes her feel good in a way
nobody else can, she continually makes excuses not to engage in a
relationship with the younger man. Andrew has the innocent worldview of
a child, asking the sort of awkward questions adults can't answer.
Ironically, he finds himself on the other end of this dynamic when his
kid brother seeks his advice on dating, and Andrew is force to admit
that he doesn't really know jack.
Cha Cha Real Smooth boasts the sort of premise that could
have fuelled an '80s John Cusack movie or a '90s Adam Sandler comedy.
Thankfully Raiff has opted for the former, and his film resembles some
lost Cameron Crowe rom-com from 1987. Say Anything would
appear to be a major influence, with Raiff's Andrew sharing a similar
mindset with Cusack's character, i.e. he's content to put his own life
on hold to make the woman he loves happy. It's a sentimental notion, but
Raiff never allows things to become sappy. It takes a hell of an ego to
write a part like this for yourself, in which you're essentially the
world's nicest guy, but Raiff has the charm to pull it off. Like his
character, Raiff's film wears its heart on its sleeve and provides a
refreshingly warm breeze in these snarky times.
What's notable and admirable about Cha Cha Real Smooth is
how, unlike so many modern American comedies, the movie has a timeless
quality. There are no gags around specifically modern preoccupations.
Rather the movie is invested in a theme that will forever resonate, the
struggle to find a soulmate, and the even greater struggle that begins
once you've found them. You could show this movie to an audience in 1982
or 2082 and they'd understand what Raiff is interrogating here.
Andrew self-deprecatingly refers to himself as a dumb kid throughout,
but as a filmmaker Raiff is as smart as any to arrive in recent years.
And like the smartest filmmakers, he understands that creating great
cinema can often be as simple as writing a couple of good parts and
having two very charismatic people make googly eyes at one another on
screen.
Cha Cha Real Smooth is on AppleTV+ from June 17th.
