Review of Where'd You Go, Bernadette (2019) by Jluis_001 — 01 Dec 2019

Versatile and prolific, Richard Linklater is a director who has achieved quite a reputation in the last 20 years but his biggest problem is how uneven his filmography is. Where'd You Go, Bernadette only reaffirms it.

This time Cate Blanchett saves his ass because of the things Linklater stopped doing as a screenwriter and that is that this time despite Bernadette being an attractive character becomes more functional because of what Cate Blanchett than because what the character actually offers. And that's the persistent problem, because although it's an interesting story about depression and anxiety, it's not done in a way that makes these emotional elements resonate and despite his capacity as a director, Linklater seems happy with taking the fast and simple route without trying to deepen in any way and so things remain just there: simple good intentions that never finish to develop.