A Beautiful Day in the Neighbhorhood – 2019 Heller

Marielle Heller (The Diary of a Teenage Girl and Can You Ever Forgive Me?) succeeds here with a third archiveable film.
She uses the old Mr. Rogers show as a narrative device entry ( this isn’t a full-blown Mr. Rogers biopic—he’s telling us this specific story about Esquire writer Lloyd Vogel)—we are on his TV set, transitions in the film often include the miniatures synonymous with the show
A well-earned weepie with multiple emotional payoff scenes—I dare you not to be moved by the sing-along in the subway scene
Soft 1970’s folk rock lovingly sets the tone. It’s not time/place accurate but I adore the Nick Drake and Cat Stevens
A great framing shot in the Chinese restaurant
A bit like Citizen Kane, The End of the Tour, Gandhi and Chaplin we have a journalist here as our way into the fascinating celebrity/artist figure (good work with bags under his eyes by cynical Lloyd Vogel portrayed by Matthew Rhys)
Tom Hanks is mesmerizing. He’s got just that everyman charm to him— but he can also disappear here and play figures like Ben Bradlee, Sully Sullenberger, and Mr. Rogers

Hanks doesn’t give the only strong performance here—he’s getting most of the buzz but Chris Cooper is one of our great actors and he’s devastatingly good here. The best vehicle for the talented actor at least since 2005’s Capote. When he tells his son (the Rhys character) that it’s too bad he’s dying because he’s just starting to know how to live it’s shattering