A dedication to careless responsibility. A eulogy to tangled childhoods. A tribute to bad fathers all around the globe. Daddy Longlegs (2009), directed by Josh and Benny Safdie, is a semi-autobiographical tale about fatherhood at its best and very worst.
Lenny (played by Ronald Bronstein), is a father for two weeks out of the year. His sons Frey, 5, and Sage, 7, fill their time with Lenny’s antics and spontaneity. He takes them on a trip upstate with his one-night stand, lets them stay up until 11 pm, and neglects to take the two to school, exchanging it for impromptu days out. Posed with fun, they are torn between the dangers of his actions and the jokes that lay between them.
Sage and Frey’s bond with their father is special. His childlike joie de vivre brings their family closer, and to them he’s a jester of magic and comedy. His lessons in harsh language, film projectionism, and New York (decorated with many real offbeat individuals) are endearing. But in one swift motion, Lenny will “blow his top.” His short temper extends to just about everyone, including the children’s mother. Their tense exchanges are troublesome and appear to have little regard for his sons’ emotional and mental psychology.
It’s clear Lenny desperately wants to be a parent. The proof of his devotion is plastered on his fridge and walls—colourful framed artwork of the three in funny situations with funny faces.
It’s easy to excuse his actions as simple screw-ups; we’ve all made them. He has a charm and coolness that almost allows it. But good parents don’t conjure hazardous entertainment, they don’t work against what parenting is: caring for a child.
In line with its intimate themes, Daddy Longlegs is photographed in the style of a fly-on-the-wall documentary, and viewers could easily mistake it as such (aside from a surrealist sequence containing a mosquito the size of a small dog). Hectic camera movement and long lenses amplify the claustrophobia of their already-cramped apartment. And 16mm film warms the eyes, with rich reds, greens, and browns painting every scene.
Delicate melodies are what complete this brut film. Not a single song on the score is out of place. Michael Hurley’s “Penguins” exists securely in this New York cityscape, soft and gentle as childhood deserves to be. The cover of the album that the song appears on actually has a familiar design to many of Frey and Sage’s drawings—a cartoon personified animal in various shades of bright clothing resting asleep in an armchair.
And into this armchair movie, safely and soundly, we sink.
4/5