Silver Linings Playbook

Silver Linings Playbook: movie and book review 

It's a two-for-one sale...err, review!

I recently finished reading the book "Silver Linings Playbook," which was good and weird and screwed up, just like the movie. But I liked it. I'm a fan of both the movie and the book...though the writer in me wants to mesh them to make both just a little bit better (in my humble opinion).

For this make more sense (in case you haven't seen the movie or read the book), here are the cast of main characters:

Pat (played by Bradley Cooper): bi-polar protagonist; the book is written from his perspective
Tiffany (played by Jennifer Lawrence): clinically depressed female lead; her husband was killed by a drunk driver
Nikki (played by Brea Bee): Pat's cheating (ex)wife, with whom he's desperately attempting to reconcile
Pat Sr. (played by Robert De Nero): Pat's father, a HUGE Philadelphia Eagles fan
Dolores (played by Jackie Weaver): Pat's mother, a loving, supportive influence in his life
Danny (played by Chris Tucker): Pat's best friend in the mental institution
Ronnie (played by John Ortiz): Pat's best friend
Veronica (played by Julie Stiles): Ronnie's wife and Tiffany's sister
Dr. Cliff (played by Anupam Kher): Pat's psychologist outside the institution

The short synopsis of the movie (and book) according to IMDB is: "After a stint in a mental institution, former teacher Pat Solitano moves back in with his parents and tries to reconcile with his ex-wife. Things get more challenging when Pat meets Tiffany, a mysterious girl with problems of her own."

To slightly elaborate on that, Pat was committed to a mental institution after nearly beating his wife's lover to death and suffering an almost complete mental break down. While in the institution and once he is released, his sole goal is to better himself and find a way to get back together with Nikki.

In the movie, Pat was institutionalized for 8 months, before his mother was able to convince the court to give her custody of him...in the book, it was 4 years. I thought the book was better in this regard - because of how things played out, it made more sense for him to have been in "the bad place" for a really long time, plus it allowed for some interesting side stories/issues, such as he thought he'd only been in the institution for about a year, thus basically losing 3 years of his life...so catching up on all that had happened in those missing years was interesting and a little heartbreaking.

Also in the book, they make it very clear (maybe about half-way through?) that Nikki divorced him while he was in the institution, so she's his ex-wife. In the movie you're not quite sure...it seems like they're divorced, but it's never explicitly explained. Knowing it's a certainty makes the ending fall together a bit better.

Another big change from the book to the movie is the role of Danny, a fellow patient at the institution and Pat's best friend in "the bad place." In the book, Pat talks about Danny a fair bit and then you finally meet him near the end. In the movie he has a much more prominent role and is excellently played by Chris Tucker (who I generally don't like). He adds another perspective and lightens things up a bit, which makes him a nice addition.

Something else I like better in the movie than in the book is the "big plot twist." It's not really that big, in that you kind of see it coming, but I don't want to risk giving it away regardless. :)  All I will say is in the movie it happens before the dance competition, which I think is a lot better than in the book, where it takes place after the competition. I felt better about Pat choosing to move forward and participating in the competition, than him completely getting tricked into doing it.

The difference in ages is also a big difference between the two mediums - in the book, Tiffany is described as being a few years older than Pat, who turns 34 near the end of the book. In the movie, Tiffany (played by Jennifer Lawrence) is clearly a good 6-8 years younger than Pat (played by Bradley Cooper). I'm a huge Jennifer Lawrence fan, so I was completely fine with this change. And to give credit where it's due, Bradley Cooper does an excellent job as Pat...which means a lot coming from me, because I don't like Bradly Cooper for the most part. He always plays a macho jerkface, which tends to tick me off. But he did a great job in his portayal of Pat.

God is also a big theme in the book, where He's nearly non-existent in the movie. Pat's prayers to God throughout the book help show how he's trying to improve himself and be a better man and husband. His family is "Catholic," the Christmas-and-Easter kind, but it is still a defining part of his character that gets left out in the movie adaptation.

Disclaimer: The movie is rated R for a reason. Not surprisingly, in both the book and movie there is a great deal of profanity, both in descriptive and exclamatory ways/terms. After her husband's death, Tiffany becomes very promiscuous, which is discussed in the movie (and explained in a letter to Pat in the book). There is also some brief nudity in the flashbacks of Pat walking in on his wife and the man she's cheating on him with in the shower. For more details, check out the PluggedIn review.

Overall, it's a messy story about two screwed up people trying to find sense and a "silver lining" in this disaster called life. I admit to preferring darker story lines, which I'm sure is a contributing factor to my liking this book and movie...that aside, I think it's an interesting commentary on life, people, mental health issues and dealing with the hand you're dealt, no matter how crappy it is...and finding the good in all the bad.


~ Katie