Movie Review: The Art of Self-Defense

The Art of Self-Defense ** ½ / *****

Directed by: Riley Stearns.

Written by: Riley Stearns.

Starring: Jesse Eisenberg (Casey), Alessandro Nivola (Sensei), Imogen Poots (Anna), Steve Terada (Thomas), Phillip Andre Botello (Kennith), Hauke Bahr (Grant), Jason Burkey (Alex), Justin Eaton (Lone Man), Dallas Edwards (Manny), Josh Fadem (Serial Killer), Leland Orser (Detective McCallister), C.J. Rush (Other Steve), Louis Robert Thompson (Veterinarian), David Zellner (Henry).

 

There is a lot to admire about Riley Stearns The Art of Self-Defense – chief among them being Jessie Eisenberg’s performance – but the film just never quite comes together. The film is supposed to be a dark comedy – and yet I don’t think ever laughed in the film. The film also wants to disturb you with its take on toxic masculinity – and yet, I don’t think it really digs very deep there either. The film gets lost somewhere along the way – too in love with its influence (the film is part The Karate Kid, part Fight Club) to really come up with anything original along the way. If you don’t see most of the twists coming in the film, you aren’t paying attention.

 

In the film, Jessie Eisenberg plays Casey – a meek, mild-mannered accountant (sigh, as an accountant, I have to say that I more bored than offended that every time a filmmaker needs to have a meek, loser character they make them an accountant – it’s lazy) who is walking home from the grocery store with dog food for his beloved dachshund, when he is attacked by a group of helmet wearing motorcyclists. He gives up his wallet easily, but they still beat him – pretty severely – and leave him there. We already know Casey is meek and mild – he struggles to make connections at work, cannot even make small talk with his “bro” co-workers in the breakroom, and can barely raise his voice above a whisper. He has no one in his life other than that dog.

 

That beat down changes his life. At first, he decides he should buy a gun to protect himself – but then happens to walk buy a karate studio, and goes in – and immediately falls in love. The studio is run by a megalomaniac with the charm of a cult leader who insists that everyone just refer to him as Sensei (Alessandro Nivola). He exercises complete control over this karate studio – and fills the head of the almost exclusively male clientele – all of whom seem to live for this karate studio – and Sensei himself. The one woman is Anna (Imogen Poots) – who is perhaps more obsessed than anyone to get Sensei’s approval – in part because she knows she will never fully have it (I have realized that she can never become a man, Sensei tells Casey one day). While Casey becomes subservient to Sensei – in his regular life, he becomes a monster. He stands up to everyone who he used to bow down to – but not in a constructive way, but in an overtly violent way. And at the studio, the violence level also increases.

 

The best thing in the movie is Eisenberg’s performance. Eisenberg is still best remembered for his brilliant performance in The Social Network as Mark Zuckerberg – and most people probably see him as that motor mouthed smartass. But Eisenberg has smartly tried to get away from that in recent years – doing quieter performances in films like Night Moves and The Double. He is still best playing assholes – but he has proven there is more than one note there. Here, he is good as the quiet, shy Casey – and gets better the bigger asshole Casey becomes. I’m not quite sure the full transition makes sense (he goes on quite a journey to get where he is at the end) – but that’s more a function of the screenplay than Eisenberg.

 

The film was written and directed by Riley Stearns – whose last film was Faults, about a cult de-programmer and his latest job. Both films are about, in a way, toxic masculinity – but Faults approached it in a more sideways manner. In The Art of Self-Defense, Stearns goes straight on – and I’m not sure the film ever really does anything surprising. It certainly tries to shock us in the end – but it isn’t particularly shocking. The film has fun playing with The Karate Kid mythos and style – but that’s really only surface level. As the film morphs into a Fight Club inspired film about this level of violence, you kind of realize the film has nothing much to say that David Fincher’s film didn’t say 20 years ago. I kept waiting for The Art of Self-Defense to go somewhere I didn’t expect it to – and I guess the last scene does that. But that’s an awful long way to go before we really do something unique.