Revolutionary Road (2008)--3/5

Leonardo DiCaprio is a perfect casting choice as Frank Wheeler, arrested man-child of "Revolutionary Road." He looks like he's grown two years to Kate Winslet's actual ten in the years since "Titanic." (And Kathy Bates is in this one as well.) Leo is thirty-four. Frank turns thirty in the movie and it's still hard to believe.

Central to "Revolutionary Road" is the idea of being trapped--in the suburbs, in a family, in a job, in the fifties. No solution is better than another. April Wheeler (Winslet) wants the family to emigrate to Paris. Frank goes along with the plan because he hates his job. But does he hate it enough to turn down a healthy raise to do the same bullshit? When telling their friends, they might as well be saying they're traveling to Titan without spacesuits. "How will you make money?" "Your wife will support you?"

Once this central conflict is finally resolved, the air goes out of "Revolutionary Road" a bit. Conflicts are mundane without the dynamic tension of whether they'll affect Frank and April's plans. Though for the most part, "Revolutionary Road" is cannily melodramatic and may strike close to home for a lot of people.


This Japanese poster makes "Revolutionary Road" look like a Beverly Lewis novel.


[Beavis laugh]