The American Labor Day release date was January 31st. Look, folks, I don’t want to tell you your job. Oh, screw that, when it comes to film (but nothing else), I love to tell you your job. What I don’t love? Doing your job. You title a film “Labor Day,” you put it out at the end of summer. This isn’t rocket science, jerks.
“Labor” doesn’t quite begin to describe this ordeal. Having missed it in theaters (I assume because of timing), it took me weeks to watch it over Netflix. And it didn’t really get better each time I started anew. In short, Adele (Kate Winslet) is a shut-in, whose bravery for going out one day is rewarded when escaped convict Frank (Josh Brolin) attaches himself to her tween, Henry (Gattlin Griffith, don’t let it be said whoever named you didn’t have an imagination, son), and inserts himself into their lives.
It’s ok. He means well. Frank’s double homicide conviction was totally an accident … except that he did it … when he was angry.
Adele’s life, thoughtfully relayed to us in tragi-vision, has made her a little gun-shy. Hubby Gerald (Clark Gregg) is long gone to go put together The Avengers or something and Adele even finds collecting the mail a stressful confrontation. Now I kept wondering what Adele lives on. She doesn’t work and I can’t believe the alimony is sweet enough to maintain much of a life, but this film isn’t terribly concerned with how a catatonic woman manages to survive, just how she falls in love with pretty much the only man she’s talked to in several years.
Now maybe it was the fact that I watched 
Labor Day in installments, but the transition from “you’re my prisoners” to doin’ chores around the house was darn near instantaneous. I mean, literally, one night mom is tied to a chair, the next day Frank is choppin’ wood and cleaning the gutters and playing ball with Henry. That’s the best part – Frank completely assumes the role of ideal provider/father. “Maybe your real dad never taught you how to play baseball, but I will …” Just wait until the paraplegic language-challenged teen from next door is thrust on Adele and HEY! It’s picnic time!
And, you know, it isn’t a real kidnapping until your live in murderer teaches you how to bake a pie from scratch with wrapped-arms-and-interlocking-fingers-Ghost-style. Are you sure you’re Jason Reitman … the director of Thank You for Smoking and Juno and Up in the Air? What the Hell is this? Did you fall asleep to Patrick Swayze and Demi Moore last night?
Labor Day sets itself in the late summer of 1987, but seems to want a small town 40s or 50s setting where your banker knows your name and police cruisers drive you home. I lived in New England at this time; pretty sure this isn’t what the small towns felt like. That’s all irrelevant – this is a phone-in. Ten years from now, nobody in the cast is gonna point to Labor Day as a labor of love, including James Van Der Beek. Dawson? Lookin’ a little Creaky these days.
Wasn’t my best review? Screw it. If everybody phoned in this one, I can, too.
While escaping a medic exam
A convict takes up with a fam
“New dad’s the best!”
Oh, give it a rest
Anymore and I’ll go on the lam
Rated PG-13, 111 Minutes
D: Jason Reitman
W: Jason Reitman
Genre: Stockholm syndrome
Type of person most likely to enjoy this film: Umm … you gotta love Kate Winslet an awful lot
Type of person least likely to enjoy this film: People with boredom thresholds
