Why ‘C’mon C’mon’ Director Didn’t Want Lead Male Character to Be ‘A Bad Person’
thewrap.comThis story about “C’mon C’mon” director Mike Mills first appeared in the Awards Preview issue of TheWrap’s awards magazine.Mike Mills’ movies strive to capture the most intimate moments, thoughts and feelings, but also to find how their gravity intersects within the wider universe of ideas and history.
It’s why his latest, “C’mon C’mon,” has the warmth and familiarity of a blanket but the profundity of a much larger story—and in this case, the writer-director said, hitting that sweet spot came from his own experience of being a parent. “When you’re holding a kid or giving them a bath or helping them, it is just about the two of you, and it is the most private little cosmos,” said Mills, who had a child with his wife, filmmaker and artist Miranda July, in 2012. “But raising a person in the world, you’re also integrated with politics, capitalism and what does it mean to be a man or woman.
It’s kind of related to everything to me.”“C’mon C’mon” is a meditative film with the loose narrative of a radio journalist, Johnny (Joaquin Phoenix), who is estranged from his sister (Gaby Hoffmann) but agrees to look after her young son (Woody Norman) while she deals with a family crisis.
Forced to keep Woody for longer than he expected, Johnny includes the boy as he interviews other kids for a radio project about their lives and their expectations for the future—and Woody takes to his uncle’s sound equipment, wandering New York streets holding up a microphone.
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