In Writer and Director Annie Baker’s Janet Planet, Janet, played by Julianne Nicholson, lies in bed with her 12-year-old daughter Lacy, played by Zoe Ziegler. Lacy says, “Every moment of my life is hell.” Surprised, Janet says she thought Lacy was happy a lot of the time.
Lacy quietly smiles, “It’s hell, but I don’t think it will last, though.”
Blankly staring up at the ceiling, Janet confesses, “I’m actually pretty unhappy, too.”
Such are the lives of Lacy and Janet. Annie Baker’s Janet Planet is truthful, sincerely sad, and authentically funny. As Janet’s friend Regina, played by free-spirited Sophie Okonedo, says, “You do make bad decisions.” Janet made a lot of bad decisions about men like her current lover Wayne, played by eccentrically distant Will Patton, who has a daughter Lacy’s age with his ex-wife. Lacy agrees with Regina that her Mom makes bad decisions when it comes to men. Still, she only has love for her Mom. She only wants her to be happy.
Although acupuncturist Janet Planet is unhappy, she tries desperately to find happiness, especially with men. And she fails miserably. In Janet Planet, we see the world through Lacy’s gentle bespectacled eyes. Lacy is the acute precocious observer of life. She stares as she gets her Mom a glass of water, when Janet and Regina argue about Janet’s bad decisions on their ecstasy trip gone bad.
Janet repeats the same mistakes over, and over, and over again, hoping to find happiness. That occurs as more pathology than insanity. Unlike her Mom, radiantly funny Lacy, who’s maybe wiser than Mom, remains the diligent observer from the sidelines, not on the field. She doesn’t participate in life. Perhaps, out of fear.
In Theodore Roosevelt’s The Man in the Arena, he said:
It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.
In Annie Baker’s touching narrative, Lacy is the profound observer in life. Although she’s smarter than most, she doesn’t or doesn’t want to participate in life. She refuses to fail while daring bravely. Lacy keeps to herself, plays with her porcelain figures. She plays it safe. In a sense, she’s afraid to live. That is hell, in a way too.
Will Lacy to step onto the field and dare to find joy? Only she knows. Janet Planet is the authentic rites of passage of a beautiful, lonely little girl defining herself in the world. Zoe Ziegler is amazingly bold and vulnerable as Lacy. Through her wide eyes and measured words, we get that there’s more going on inside her heart than her in her head.
In the poignant narrative arc, Lacy and Janet lie in bed at night. Janet says, “I’ve always had this knowledge that I can make any man fall in love with me, if I tried. And think it’s sort of ruined my life.” Lacy says, “Can you stop… Stop trying.” Lacy speaks timeless wisdom. Still, she can’t make herself happy.
I was much like Lacy when I was 12 years old. I wouldn’t get too happy, because I was waiting for the other shoe to drop. Something would go wrong, and I would be sad. Like Lacy, I was the smart quiet observer of life, afraid to live life.
In eloquent narrative arc, Lacy looks from behind her glasses. Will she dare bravely to be happy? We all hope so. Everyone deserves to be happy. Yet, we have to dare to fail bravely to do so. And if we fail, we get back up, and try again. That makes Janet Planet something very special. It’s my favorite movie of the year so far.
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This Post is republished on Medium.
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Photo credit: Author
