"Human Capital" (2020) Review
"Human Capital" an expression of American class warfare. An amorality tale of the no-win situation for working-class people, when the wealthy throw money and superiority at the problem. Isolated, faced with the virus, this pill is all the more bitter to swallow. In the opening moments of the film, we follow Roberto (Dominic Colón), a waiter at a well-to-do private function hall. We see him work. We see him be the first to leap to the aid of a distressed pregnant woman; we see him take a moment to have a smoke and find some relief and composure in the silence. As he's peddling home to his wife through dark winding roads, he's sideswiped by a vehicle and killed. Who was behind the wheel? Will there be justice?
At its core, "Human Capital" it's a tale of two entangled families. Drew (Liev Schreiber) is an estate agent and a father of teen daughter Shannon (Maya Hawke), and soon to be father with a new wife and school counsellor Ronnie (Betty Gabriel). Shannon is dating Jamie (Fred Hechinger) the son of investment mogul Quint (Peter Sarsgaard) and long-suffering trophy wife Carrie (Marisa Tomei). In the wings is Shannon's new boyfriend Ian (Alex Wolff), because the closeted Jamie is asking her to keep up appearances to avoid conflict with his tyrannical father. If it sounds messy, that's because it is, and we're going to spend this brisk run time disentangling this tightly wound drama.
Director Marc Meyers craft is about finding the temperature of each story segment and character. Primarily, this bleak tale extracts the warmth and intimacy of home. It's an aesthetically cold palette to complement the raw and selfish survival emotions of the characters. "Human Capital" does not unfold linearly. The death of Roberto instigates and exploration of character threads. Meyers and screenwriter Oren Moverman (writer of Woody Harrelson's answer to "Bad Lieutenant" - "Rampart") set the stage and begin a tactical, first-person, detour to individual characters.
First, it's Drew, using his daughter as an introductory crotch to meet Quint. Schreiber's Drew frustratingly naive, assuming that working with Quint means in anyway that this aloof and elitist investor would care about the fortune (relative chump change to him) returns on the investment. Sarsgaard has such a great ability to sneer at other people like they aren't even in the same species that make him perfect as this callous broker. It's not greed is good; it's his profit.
Second, it's Tomei's Carrie deadened by life as a possession, silence and service. Tomei contends with a spectrum of emotions as a mother, an individual and her space in surface family construct. Reputation is more important than reality. Her covert rebellion is infidelity while she reflexively keeps that a secret to keep her station. It's an arc that can begin empty and ends emptier.
Finally, we follow Hawke's Shannon. She's a fearless yet compassionate outsider who determines her value being close with those outside of the closed focus of high-school conformity. Shannon is both 'beard' to the closeted rich kid and drawn to disruptive Ian (Wolff is ranging from reflective to explosive), who frequents her stepmother Ronnie's school counselling. Hawke's Shannon balances that teen life-and-death, end of the world passion and the cool, sensible head of a young woman that cannot be maintained by her high-functioning ape, impulse fuelled male counterparts.
The picture is evident by the end. We see who is picking up the bill. Socrates once said, "the greatest way to live with honour in this world is to be what we pretend to be." "Human Capital" is obviously 'pretend'; it makes no concessions for what the world is, or what it feels we're worth.
★★½/★★★★
[youtube=://www.youtube.com/watch?v=53dmj3f8vmI&w=854&h=480]
