The film starts with an unconvincing flashback to the late 1980s when Robin Williams (looking old) is with his young kids and happy. We then come to the present day as Williams playing Henry Altmann is stuck in a traffic jam and getting irritated by everything and anything. He gets involved in a motor accident and then gets told by his doctor (Mila Kunis) who herself is having a bad day and getting further upset by Williams that he only has 90 minutes to live.
Williams decides to makes things right with his wife and child but things do not go according to plan which just makes him more angry and upset.
The film is a black comedy and I think the intention was to have some freewheeling lines from Williams about observations regarding anger with humour. However in the context of the film it does not work. His character was a nice family guy, where life has dealt him a bad hand as one of his kids died.
I doubt he is the angriest man in Brooklyn, as he has a family business, seems to have money and getting stuck in traffic in NYC during rush house will make anyone irate.
Williams and Kunis are fine, the screenplay and directing is garbled and unconvincing. Where there should had been tenderness, you get Williams suddenly getting angry because that is the title of the film. It is not really black enough nor is it funny.
Of course as Robin Williams died soon after the film was released, this makes some of the sentiments in this film rather tragic especially as he at one point wants to jump off the Brooklyn Bridge.
It's been plain that in recent years some of his comedy films have been lame and Williams was reduced to cameos and voice overs. He probably mined all that he could do with the dramatic sinister guys he played over a decade ago and this film shows that even Williams talent could not do much with poor material.
The Angriest Man in Brooklyn
2014
Action / Comedy / Drama
The Angriest Man in Brooklyn
2014
Action / Comedy / Drama
Keywords: dark comedydoctorbrooklyn, new york city
Plot summary
Some people have bad days. Henry Altmann (Williams) has one every day. Always unhappy and angry at the world including everyone in it, Henry sits impatiently at the doctor's office when he is finally seen by Dr. Sharon Gill (Kunis). Sharon, who is enduring her own bad day, reveals that Henry has a brain aneurysm. This news makes Henry even angrier, yelling at Sharon he demands to know how much time he has left. Faced with Henry's anger and insults, Sharon abruptly tells him he has only 90 minutes. Shocked and reeling by this news, Henry storms out of the office leaving Sharon stunned by what she has just done in a lapse of judgment. As Sharon goes on a city-wide search, Henry struggles with his diagnosis, determined to make amends with everyone he has hurt in his life.
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Permanent state of agitation
This will be the first time I review a Robin Williams film since his passing and I notice that he has several projects yet to be released. Each one will be a painful reminder of how much we lost, Williams was a never ending spring of zany talent.
Sad to say also that in this film though Williams delivers a superb performance the guy who really should have done this film has not been with us for 14 years. Walter Matthau was born to play the lead in this film and he's passed also.
If Robin Williams isn't mad at something he'd have to invent a reason. In The Angriest Man In Brooklyn Williams is a 60 something man who lost one of his two sons a few years back and now remains in a permanent state of agitation.
But this is a day that he gets the worst news of all, but he doesn't break his stride one bit. Unfortunately he gets a substitute doctor to read him his diagnosis of a brain aneurysm and Mila Kunis is having a bad day herself. As Williams starts pressing her buttons Kunis blurts out you have 90 minutes.
So for the rest of the film Kunis is chasing Williams trying to rectify her time error. And Williams is out painfully finding out that he's pushed friends and family so far away that the only one who really cares it seems is this doctor who was a total stranger this morning.
Terminal diagnosis is not usually a subject for humor, but we're dealing with Robin Williams here. The best comedy in the film centers around Williams and Kunis with an Uzbek cabdriver whom he opened the film with before. I have to say Kunis really gets into the spirit of Williams character when he meets the Uzbek again. Williams also as a nice scene with James Earl Jones who takes a small role as a stuttering salesman in a camera shop.
With a lot of Williams films you get a torrent of feelings some of them working at cross section in your mind. He's not a lovable man, but in the end you understand him sort of. Life can grind you down over the years and it certainly was true of him.
This fortunately is not the swan song of Robin Williams. Let's hope that the unreleased work keeps up this standard.
It fails to be a comedy
Henry Altmann (Robin Williams) was once a happy man with a young family. Twenty five years later, he's foul-mouthed and angry at everything. He lost his son Peter two years ago. He's having a bad day with a NY cab ramming into him. Dr. Sharon Gill (Mila Kunis) is weary of her endless miserable job. She covers for a doctor and tells Henry that he has a deadly brain aneurysm. He berates her until she relents and gives him 90 minutes to live. He storms out in a crazed rage. She comes to her senses and goes in search for him. He decides to reconcile with his wife Bette (Melissa Leo) and son Tommy (Hamish Linklater). His brother Aaron (Peter Dinklage) joins Dr. Gill in her search.
The characters are way too angry to be funny. This movie would be better as a dark drama. The problem is that it keeps trying to be funny and failing. This really shouldn't be a comedy. Or else the other option is for Mila Kunis to play it normal in a comedy. Let Robin go crazy in the movie while everybody reacts to him. That could be funny black comedy. The two of them seem to be competing to see who's the more malcontent. The movie just doesn't work.