Cake (2014) (English Language)

Spread the love

Review

102min

Cast: Jennifer Aniston, Adriana Barraza, Sam Worthington…and more

Jennifer Aniston stars as a callous and cynical woman struggling with the devastating physical and emotional effects of a horrific accident, an encounter at a support group sparks a fascination with a woman who commits suicide and an unlikely bond with her grieving family, a bond that may yet save her from drowning in her own suppressed grief.

‘Cake‘ is a raw and often unsympathetic drama, small in scale but focused on an individual’s struggle to cope with great loss in all the wrong ways, Jennifer Aniston’s performance is revelatory as a pharmaceutical-addicted middle-class woman whose life breaks down around her after her accident but leaves us questioning whether her abrasive personality is a result of it or merely made worse by it.

Whilst this is very much a ‘domestic’ almost TV-movie style drama with little spectacle to sink your teeth into, ‘Cake’ manages to be quite grim and Aniston’s portrayal is of a woman unable to muster any emotion other than anger and contempt through her few sober lucid moments, this separates the film from its counterparts and the lack of sentimentality is not something you might associate with this leading-lady.

It’s impossible to appraise this film without focusing on the central performance by Jennifer Aniston as it is basically the sum of very few parts that make up this simple drama, her performance is surprisingly bare, both physically and emotionally, “heavier” than you would have seen her on magazine covers and not a hint of make-up apart from heavy scars that are clearly more than skin deep.

A small and somber but effective drama, ‘Cake‘ is the film that should finally kill the “Rachel Greene” persona when it comes to Jennifer Aniston and hopefully signals a career path she will continue to travel down.

_________________________________________________________________________________

Similar films you may like (Home Video)

Wild (2014)

Reese Witherspoon stars in this real-life account of a young woman on a downward spiral due to a tragic event in her life, who hikes 1,100 miles of the Pacific Crest Trail alone from the Mojave Desert to Washington State along the American West Coast to recover her former self.

Directed by Jean-Marc Vallée and starring Reese Witherspoon, Laura Dern and Thomas Sadoski among others.