3 Generations

3 Generations

Well intentioned movies may not be well executed. Truth can get in the way of being tasteful.

This is the troubling case of “3 Generations,” in which the subject of gender dysphoria is approached by excellent cast of actors but not much else.

Directed and co-written by Gaby Dellal, who also co-wrote it with Nikole Beckwith when it was called “About Ray” in 2015 at its premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival, this film shows the required sensitivity to such emotionally complicated themes that confront us. In so doing, however, Dellal and Beckwith skim rather than digging deeper into their subject matter. The actresses he has gathered are beyond capable enough to dig into this or at least skate through the movie’s difficult moments with less clumsy jokes.

Ray is a transgender teenager living in New York City played by Elle Fanning. Ramona was born as Ray but from his young age he knew that he is a boy inside a girl body. At sixteen now, he wants to start transitioning physically, too hormones included. However confident about this critical move on his path he may be, his single mother Maggie (Naomi Watts) still holds back although she does everything right and supportive publicly.

Maggie and Ray stay with Maggie’s mother Dolly (Susan Sarandon) and her lifelong companion Frances (Linda Emond). They all have one of those fantastically attractive sprawling only in the movies brownstones though it isn’t clear how any of them afford anything there. As far as possible, one might argue that Dolly should have been able to understand Ray’s need to assert his real self because she herself is gay; yet interestingly she doesn’t which seems neglected by the film makers.

But really speaking, “3 Generations” isn’t about Ray anyway; instead it’s all about paperwork specifically their respective consent forms for medical treatment because he’s under 18. Thus, the movie really revolves around Maggie who hesitates whether to reach out to Ray’s father (Tate Donovan), who left him when he was a baby or to sign his name without stressing about past mistakes that have been suppressed for long. Though this may be more accessible to a wider audience, it is not as compelling as what Ray undergoes.

Even with shaggy hair and bulky sweaters, Fanning remains a charismatic presence onscreen. She has adolescent angst with an extra sharp edge; Ray’s struggle isn’t just against his own puberty but rather at large the life prison of his being. We can see glimpses of this turmoil from the films he makes using his mobile phone camera but they are mostly of skateboarding and a girl he likes the soft focus MTV sort of thing.

But even less defined are the women who help raise him. “3 Generations,” unfortunately, brings back memories of last year’s “20th Century Women” which had similar themes and starred Fanning among others including a wide range of influential mother figures shaping up an unconventional boyhood home setting.

Watts’ portrayal of Maggie is predicated on her having a collection of tics and neurosis; the fact that she keeps trying to quit smoking is just an example of how things are inside her. Even less inviting for Sarandon and Emond, who engage in nothing more than shticky bickering and bantering; they poke their noses into things with good intentions while keeping alcohol flowing an indulgence meant to imply that they are relatively easygoing. A preposterous scene wherein three ladies jump into Dolly’s dilapidated Rambler to save Ray as soon as he encounters his father in suburbia appears like it belongs to another story, thus revealing the hollowness of the characters.

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