‘Lousy Carter’ Review — Get Your David Krumholtz Fix Post-‘Oppenheimer’

The Big Picture

• David Krumholtz is terrific in
  Lousy Carter
  despite the film’s shaggy limitations.
• Lousy Carter
  is a darkly comic dramedy that almost deconstructs its own rhythms.
• Krumholtz ensures the film works through its messy ending, delivering a great final monologue.

There is a good chance that general audiences will know David Krumholtzfor his standout supporting performance in the recent Best Picture-winnerOppenheimer or his long career appearing in projects like The Ice Storm, 10 Things I Hate About You, and The Deuce. However, one can only hope everyone who loved him so much in those parts also now sees him take on a leading role in writer-director Bob Byington’s Lousy Carter. This isn’t because his latest is anything like that ambitious and often unwieldy historical epic about the cataclysmic creation of the atomic bomb. Rather, it is because he remains a great screen presence no matter the shaggy limitations of the film itself. It isn’t perfect, but that’s fitting considering the rough edges of its central character. Really, it couldn’t be any other way and remain true.

Though it features a similarly flawed man at its center, it is about the most starkly opposite film to Oppenheimer in basically every other way. It is a downbeat affair, defined by droll comedy and the almost inconsequential goings-on of its central character. And yet, with a terrific Krumholtz at the center, it manages to emerge as a darkly comic dramedy that almost deconstructs its own rhythms. Even when it doesn’t fully hold together in key moments, especially in the end, the overall experience is given comedic life just as it places itself on the edge of death. It almost falls off a cliff a couple of times, but Krumholtz always pulls it back.

What Is ‘Lousy Carter’ About?

Centered around a troubled man named Carter (Krumholtz), his already dwindling zest for life is now running mighty thin. The well-worn premise involves him learning that he has only six months to live. Realizing that he hasn’t really lived a life in the time he has up until now, instead coasting off the somewhat acclaimed animated film he made long ago, he sets out to try to complete the Nabokov adaptation that has sat on the back burner for some time. Well, at least he says he’s going to do this. Most of the time, he takes part in snarky exchanges with his friend Herschel (Martin Starr), teaches a bizarre graduate seminar class on F. Scott Fitzgerald’s “The Great Gatsby,” and forms a fraught connection with his student Gail (Luxy Banner) who always keeps cracking open a can of Lone Star beer. Oh, and he also has conversations with his therapist (Stephen Root) that don’t appear to be helping. Plus, his mom seems to be having a hard time in her older years and he is estranged from his sister. On top of that, Carter is also having an affair with Hershcel’s wife. He’s the worst type of guy that you’d have a hard time being friends with, but he is an interesting subject for a character study in Krumholtz’s hands. The film occasionally loses its grasp on the material, but he never does.

Indeed, much of the film is just about how Carter is kind of a loser. He makes Bob Odenkirk’s character in the recent Lucky Hank, the regrettably canceled series that still ended on a high note, look like a model man by comparison. Carter feels no remorse for his many flaws, but that isn’t something Byington dwells on. Instead, in his eyes, it’s all one dark joke after another where the punchlines are absurd in some moments and sad in others. This is a world where planning for a funeral ends up settling on a bowling alley. Despite warnings that this is an ill-advised venue, the service does hilariously take place there with the thudding sound of the ball hitting the lane and the subsequent clatter of pins serving as constant comedic background noise. That is as good a summary for the general way Lousy Carter plays out.

Everything feels like comedic background noise to the impending reality we will all have to face (death) and how we cope with it. In the case of Carter, he remains stubbornly rather smarmy. There is never any truly showstopping moment of clarity or transformation. Instead, he just halfheartedly latches on to a couple of different things while the days count down. This could easily prove infuriating to those looking for a character to show some sort of development, but that’s kind of the point. Carter is a frustrating guy and the way the movie bounces around to the various scenarios he snarkily trudges through is where it is often sharply funny, precisely because of how little changes. While it would be wrong to call it satire, there is a sense that the film is almost trying to break itself and how these types of stories are supposed to go. Even when some of the transition effects can feel a little clunky and the technical elements rough around the edges, just getting to accompany Krumholtz through the intentionally scattered rhythms of the film ensures it works. He is the glue holding it together.

Krumholtz Ensures ‘Lousy Carter’ Works Through Its Ending

The conclusion of the film does put its lead actor to the test, going from an appropriate gag of a reveal to one that is more messy and not quite as successful, though he rises to the challenge. Whether you consider it Byington thumbing his nose at the audience, the way these films often go, or just storytelling in general, the final monologue of sorts that Krumholtz delivers feels like one only he could pull off. It’s both ridiculous and oddly riveting just to see it all go off the rails while he keeps his feet firmly planted on the ground. For one more moment, we get a reminder of what made everything work up until then just before death finally comes. It’s not in the way you would expect, but the strongest parts of the film never were either.

At its best, Lousy Carter is a showcase for Krumholtz who makes the most of getting to inhabit a film of smaller emotional scale and thematic scope that still manages to sneak up on you. It could be reduced to just being a disposable lark, but he gives it that extra spark. There are just so many moments where you can see the glint in his eye as he delivers a sly retort that works just as well as the scenes where he says nothing at all, the silence of his exasperation speaking volumes all on its own. Though comedic performances can often be underrated when it comes to awards, this is one that shows it requires equally as much subtlety and care to ensure these beats hit just as much as the dramatic ones. Krumholtz can be flustered, frustrating, and funny in one moment just as he is sneakily somber in another, never once falling back on only doing the same thing. He always brings something new to each scene, ensuring they don’t blur together too much even as the editing invites this.

In the end, even when it feels like the film might be less varied in its approach, the range of its lead actor is what gives it shape and form. He takes what could have easily been a one-note character and gives him a whole variety of layers that all pay off comedically just as they do in an unexpectedly emotional fashion. He’s a curmudgeon who doesn’t change much yet has just enough charm buried underneath that it makes you enjoy spending time with him, perhaps despite yourself, as it means you can just sit back and observe a master actor at work. Carter may remain quite lousy, but with Krumholtz at the helm, this film is anything but.

Lousy Carter is in theaters in the U.S. and on VOD starting March 29. Click below for showtimes.

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