O<\/span>ne minute a man is a hot young movie star; the next, he\u2019s a silver fox. Who knows where the time goes? There are lots of movies about aging Hollywood actresses\u2014Sunset Boulevard<\/a> and All About Eve are prime examples\u2014but somehow we\u2019re supposed to assume that growing older doesn\u2019t faze men as much. A woman generally loses some of her allure as she ages; it\u2019s easier for a man to ease into a state of sexy gravitas. That\u2019s true of both George Clooney<\/a> and the George Clooney-like character he plays in Noah Baumbach\u2019s Jay Kelly<\/a>, premiering at the Venice Film Festival. You couldn\u2019t find a more fitting performer for this story of a ragingly successful actor who, after an encounter with an old friend that begins with fond reminiscing and ends in a fistfight, reconsiders everything he\u2019s done with his life. The idea by itself is refreshing, and it gives Clooney lots to work with: as Jay, he gets to razzle-dazzle one minute\u2014anytime he\u2019s on set, or in a crowd\u2014and brood over his many mistakes the next. Clooney can do it all.<\/p>\n Yet there\u2019s something strangely inert about Jay Kelly. Baumbach co-wrote the script with Emily Mortimer, a marvelous actor herself, who also shows up here in just a few brief scenes. There\u2019s nothing overtly dislikable about the film, and there are a handful of scenes that are beautifully written, acted, and directed. But Jay Kelly feels more sentimental than truly thoughtful, particularly in the motif that resounds like a clanging bell in Jay\u2019s brain: Why didn\u2019t I spend more time with my kids? Jay has two, an older daughter (Riley Keough<\/a>) who harbors bitterness toward her her father, and a younger one (Grace Edwards) who understands him better, though she\u2019s just about to go off to college. His only true friend is the guy who, the movie reminds us several times, gets a 15% cut of everything he earns, his manager Ron (played, superbly, by Adam Sandler<\/a>). And is that really a friend at all? Both he and Ron confront that question, and the answer they come up with makes neither of them happy.<\/p>\n Maybe the problem is that Jay Kelly tries to cover so much ground that it ends up skating over things that should be momentous. As the movie opens, Jay is filming the final scene of his most recent big movie. (It\u2019s called Eight Men from Now, an obvious but not particularly relevant nod to Budd Boetticher\u2019s 1956 western Seven Men from Now.) He\u2019s already gone through more than a half-dozen takes, but he wants to do one more. This is his refrain: he’s so devoted to perfection that he\u2019s sure he can always top himself. When he finally leaves the set, he waves to the whole crew, thanking them heartily, and they love it. He feeds off that kind of attention. When he\u2019s alone, which is hardly ever, he doesn\u2019t know what to do with himself. Another of the movie\u2019s refrains, repeated perhaps a few too many times, is \u201cIt\u2019s harder than you think to be yourself.\u201d<\/p>\n Alienated or semi-alienated from his daughters, Jay is delighted and intrigued when he runs into an old acting-school friend, Billy Crudup<\/a>\u2019s Timothy. On impulse, they go out for drinks. Timothy is now a child psychiatrist; he simply opted out of acting, or so Jay thinks. He heaps praise on his old friend, revealing his own insecurities\u2014Timothy was a Method guy, denoting a level of seriousness Jay feels he could never achieve. Then Timothy, affable at first, turns on him. It turns out Timothy believes Jay is the very reason he hasn\u2019t had a career. In interviews, Jay has often jokingly told a story about accidentally getting his first big role because he tagged along on a friend\u2019s audition. Timothy was that friend, and in his view, Jay just used him. \u201cYou stole my life,\u201d he says bitterly, and Jay is crestfallen. He may be oblivious\u2014but he isn\u2019t cruel.<\/p>\n Greta Gerwig and Adam Sandler in Jay KellyCourtesy of Netflix<\/span><\/p>\n There\u2019s plenty to dig into there, but before you know it, Jay Kelly is off to the next thing. This is a restless, wriggly movie. There\u2019s the film festival in Tuscany that wants to honor Jay with a fancy tribute. Jay at first says no, then changes his mind when he realizes his younger daughter is going to be traveling in Europe around the same time. Consequently, Baumbach weaves in a long sequence, set on a train from Paris to the Italian countryside, that might have been nipped and tucked, or nearly altogether excised. Because there are people around Jay nearly every moment, the movie is packed with supporting actors who show up for just a scene or two, including Jim Broadbent as the benevolent director who gave Jay his big break, Alba Rohrwacher as a charming festival gofer, Greta Gerwig<\/a> as Ron\u2019s harried wife, and Stacy Keach as Jay\u2019s garrulous but difficult father. Laura Dern<\/a> shows up for a hot minute as Jay\u2019s frustrated publicist; she and Sandler have the best scene in the movie, reflecting on the time they almost got together forever, though they\u2019re now settled with other partners.<\/p>\n Clooney\u2019s Jay Kelly is the beaming, brooding star at the center of this constellation. As much light as he gives off, he actually soaks up more from those around him: he needs them in a way they don\u2019t need him. There\u2019s something quietly touching about this performance\u2014Clooney manages to make you care about a man who really may be pretty much empty. When he finally gets to that tribute in Tuscany\u2014with much angst and strife along the way\u2014he sits with the audience as they watch the predictably laudatory assemblage of film clips drawn from every era of Jay Kelly\u2019s career. Only it\u2019s snapshots from Clooney\u2019s career we\u2019re seeing: clips from Michael Clayton, The Thin Red Line, even 2020\u2019s The Midnight Sky, in which Clooney plays a loner-scientist with a big gray beard. We watch him watching himself\u2014this is not just Jay Kelly watching Jay Kelly, but George Clooney watching George Clooney, in roles where he looks pleasantly dignified in that middle-aged way, but also at times impossibly young, a baby movie star just taking his first steps. The look on his face\u2014on Jay\u2019s face, on Clooney\u2019s face\u2014is one of pure wonder. Who is that person? he seems to be asking himself, enchanted and seduced by his own image. It\u2019s the best visual question mark in a movie filled with unanswerable questions.<\/p>\n<\/span><\/div>\n