Love & Mercy Review- By Michael J. Carlisle

Title: Love & Mercy
Year: 2015
Director: Bill Pohland
Country: US
Language: English

Emerging at the vanguard of "California Sound" in the early 60's, The Beach Boys consisted of brothers Brian, Dennis and Carl Wilson, their cousin Mike Love, and their friend Al Jardine. Brian was the leader of the band, enticing the group to experiment with jazz, psychedelic and baroque music. Starting with rather simplistic "feel good" tunes, their 66' album Pet Sounds represented a departure from elementary themes and a move toward greater depth. Despite their commercial and critical success,  the member's individual lives would slowly unravel due to mental illness and substance abuse.

Love and Mercy is ingeniously crafted through two different periods in Brian Wilson's life. In the 1960s, the artist struggles with emerging psychosis as he attempts to craft his pop masterpiece.  In the 1980s, he is a broken, confused man under the 24-hour watch of shady therapist Dr. Eugene Landy.

Paul Dano's uncanny resemblance of a youthful 1960's Wilson is quite astonishing; it certainly shows Dano's range as an actor. John Cusack's 80's incarnation is a little off-putting in comparison, but it certainly doesn't distract from the remarkable story being told. Though the subject of Brian Wilson’s tumultuous life has been examined onscreen many times - most notably in the 1995 documentary Brian Wilson: I Just Wasn’t Made for These Times- it hasn't been this engaging. The script, written by Oren Moverman and Michael Alan Lerner, is quite daring and imaginative. Director Bill Pohland sought to make picture more complex than most biographical films, and I feel he succeeded. 

The composer and sound designers do a great job and getting us inside the head of the famed musician. We not only hear the beautiful symphonies Wilson creates, but also the ravaging nightmares of a schizoeffective mind. His tortured soul hits us in ways we could not have imagined. Ultimately Love & Mercy is a delicate balance of love and hate, light and darkness, hope and despair. Surprisingly,  the film is an accurate representation of the events in his life, at least according to Wilson himself.

The film isn't perfect; I wish the film had a better way of letting the audience know how much time has passed (for example Wilson's relationship with Melinda doesn't "seem" like it has lasted years by the time the doc forces them to break up)  John Cusack and Elizabeth Banks' onscreen chemistry could be a little bit tighter and the running time could be 20 minutes shorter. Overall however, I was quite impressed with this picture and would definitely recommend it. Praise it! 4/5