Skip to footer

'Cake,' starring Jennifer Aniston, could have used more layers

( R ) ( Monitor Movie Guide )

The movie is designed as an Oscar makeover for its star, but it's all too obvious about what it's up to.

|
Cinelou Films/AP
Jennifer Aniston in a scene from the film, 'Cake.'
  • By Peter Rainer Film critic

Jennifer Aniston plays a severely depressed woman dealing with chronic pain in Daniel Barnz’s “Cake,” one of those movies designed as an Oscar make-over for its star. It didn’t work in this case. Aniston was not nominated for Best Actress, perhaps because the film is so obvious about what it’s up to. 

As the pain-killer-popping Claire, covered in prosthetic scars, Aniston is playing a tough-tender type whose closest bond is with Silvana (Adriana Barraza), her Mexican housekeeper, who dutifully drives her on errands and even to Tijuana, Mexico, to score cut-rate pills. (If anybody deserved an Oscar nomination, it’s Barraza.) The scenes between these two women are more believable and finely observed than the ones between Claire and her ex-husband (Chris Messina) or between her and the husband (Sam Worthington) of a woman (Anna Kendrick) in Claire’s support group who killed herself. “Cake” could have used more layers. Grade: C (Rated R for language, substance abuse and brief sexuality.)

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.
editor@csmonitor.com
Subscribe
Mark Sappenfield
Editor

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

Subscribe to insightful journalism

QR Code to 'Cake,' starring Jennifer Aniston, could have used more layers
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/The-Culture/Movies/2015/0123/Cake-starring-Jennifer-Aniston-could-have-used-more-layers
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe