Product placement takes over The Meddler

May 20, 2016
Issue 

The Meddler
Written and directed by Lorene Scafaria
Starring Susan Sarandon, Rose Byrne, JK Simmons

One place where the personal is very political is the sometimes fraught relationships between mothers and daughters.

Some time ago Hollywood screenwriter Lorene Scafaria, while dealing with a major project, also had to grapple with difficulties with her mother. That became the raw material for her new film, The Meddler.

But along the way the film got hijacked by product placement. Apple obviously paid the lion's share of production costs, followed by Toyota, Sony Music and Harley Davidson. A Los Angeles shopping mall gets alot of screen time, too.

Susan Sarandon manages to actually put in a decent performance as the grieving, emotionally needy widow — given that the script is an embarrassment.

However, apparently the only point to this film is to tick off brand names.

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