'Lonely Planet' barely can be bothered to go anywhere
Netflix
With a weirdly passive-aggressive title like “Lonely Planet,” writer-director Susannah Grant (“Catch and Release”) would seem to be examining some people’s struggle to be alone, or at least explore the potential folly of confusing fantasy for reality, or maybe just look at the romanticism of travel and how to cross-reference connections abroad with the everyday realities of non-vacation relationships.
Instead, this forgettable Netflix romance has less feeling and insight about escape and feeling found than one listen to Taylor Swift’s “Getaway Car.”
The premise seems like a nice enough beach read, if not just the capper to 2024’s trilogy of older women/younger men relationships following “The Idea of You” and “A Family Affair”: Acclaimed novelist Katherine (Laura Dern) plans to detach from her crumbling relationship in the U.S. and at last complete her latest book at a writers’ retreat in Morocco. Until she feels a spark with Owen (Liam Hemsworth in a part Armie Hammer would’ve played under different circumstances), an apparent finance bro (his last name is Brophy!!) who’s actually a good dude who doesn’t want to betray his promise to a client while working on a deal. That Owen is there with his girlfriend, breakout first-time writer Lily (Diana Silvers), should lead to a difficult fork in the road for a guy tagging along for the sort of travel he claims to not even enjoy. In practice “Lonely Planet” remains immensely low stakes throughout, with underwhelming developments between each pairing that favor proximity over thought and simplicity over believability.
“Hold on hold on hold on,” you might say. “Is it sexy? It is romantic? Can I watch it casually while I put away laundry?” No, no, and I guess? You could also track down the immensely superior “Cairo Time,” set on a different corner of Africa but also dealing with the feelings and uncertainties of a woman of a certain age (in this case, Patricia Clarkson) and a sense of comfort that may or may not need to lead to a decision.
“Lonely Planet” takes the cheapest possible way out with all of its drama, giving hardly anyone anything to play (please just watch Dern’s Oscar-winning turn in the extraordinary “Marriage Story” again instead of this) and refusing to provide what should power these stories, which is engaging moments during hard situations when characters have to figure out what to do. Katherine and Owen really don’t know each other well enough to handle things this way, and depicting infatuation as enduring love for characters like this is foolish rather than aspirational.
Not to be mistaken for “The Loneliest Planet,” “Lonely Planet” is not terrible enough to inspire anger but so insubstantial as to hardly even qualify as a story. It’s a few people in one place for a while, arguing or not, kissing or not, making no impression at all.
D+
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