Fast-Forward Theater: You Poor Thing

THE ASSISTANT (D+) - Tedium is not the only fatal flaw of this dashed-off drama about a day in the life of the lowly assistant to a mogul of Weinsteinian proportions and proclivities, a man who has created a toxic, oxygen-starved workplace that teeters on eggshells. Can you bring yourself to care

Julia Garner stars as gloomy Jane, who is apparently so harried and unappreciated that she is pitied by co-workers and clients alike as the taken-for-granted martyr. We know her job is tedious, because filmmaker Kitty Green (making her feature debut) makes us watch Jane perform the same tasks over and over again, punishing us, too, in the process. I counted five separate trips to the copy machine -- though, to be fair, one of those tasks involved scanning something, not making copies of it. (Multiple pointless elevator rides, too.) She dutifully disinfects the big guy's (casting) couch and cleans up other office messes (including -- gasp -- drug needles). And we know the boss (unseen, unnamed) is a supreme jerk, because he chews her out over the phone over petty slights, prompting Jane to draft a follow-up email apologizing and begging to keep her job. (That same scenario plays out twice.)

Almost nothing happens in the first half hour of this 87-minute drudge-fest (less time if you fast forward strategically, like we did). When things do happen, they often take place furtively -- whispers in the office, vague glances, unintelligible voices on the other end of the phone line. The movie -- for no apparent reason -- refuses to name the company or the boss himself, which leads to ridiculous dialogue and plot points. On the one hand, it's cute that everyone need only refer to "he" or "him" and there's no mistaking who they are talking about; on the other hand, everyone answers the phone casually (like no one in a business ever would) merely to maintain the weird movie choice of being nameless. Another oddity comes toward the end when a "ding" announces an email from the boss on Jane's computer -- and you realize that it's literally just a movie sound effect, because otherwise, her computer would be dinging all day, seeing how swamped she is with work.

To top it all off, if the point of the movie is that Jane is so overloaded that she doesn't have a single moment to remember her father's birthday, then why does she really not look that busy? Yeah, she has to juggle the boss' wife, mistress, floozy actress of the day, Japanese businessmen and asshole Hollywood actors, but there's little evidence that she doesn't have time to think or eat (though she doesn't have much of an appetite, it's clear). In fact, she has time in the middle of the day to go to HR and complain that Mr. Man randomly hired a young woman from Idaho, who just showed up unannounced and required chaperoning to a hotel, which is supposed to signal to us (yet again) that the boss is a sleazebag, even though such a move, in an of itself, doesn't seem improper or illegal.

That scene (between Garner and Matthew Mcfadyen) is the only compelling part of the film, as we watch him slowly turn the tables on Jane and make her feel more miserable and helpless than when she walked through his door. Are we to assume that Jane has previously suffered more harshly than the minor indignities we witness during this one random day of her life? Was she ever forced to watch him jerk off into a plant? No evidence of that. Is it just that she works for a pervy jerk who belittles her for mis-juggling his various love interests and maybe bringing him chicken instead of turkey on his sandwich?

Who knows? Who cares?