{"id":1440,"date":"2026-06-09T04:13:04","date_gmt":"2026-06-09T04:13:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/uspropertymoves.com\/?p=1440"},"modified":"2026-06-09T04:13:04","modified_gmt":"2026-06-09T04:13:04","slug":"the-accompanist-review-susan-sarandon-and-aubrey-plaza-in-zach-woods-sharply-acted-but-overly-precious-feature-debut","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/uspropertymoves.com\/?p=1440","title":{"rendered":"\u2018The Accompanist\u2019 Review: Susan Sarandon and Aubrey Plaza in Zach Woods\u2019 Sharply Acted but Overly Precious Feature Debut"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<!-- do not apply CSS styles to this element! --><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>\n\tThere\u2019s a high level of difficulty in what Susan Sarandon pulls off with apparent ease in <em>The Accompanist.<\/em> As Sylvia, the foster parent of a young girl, she plays a character who is a little wacky and indulgent, kind and at times wise but with emotional baggage of her own. And Sarandon turns what might have been a blueprint for sentimentality and clich\u00e9s into a believable, idiosyncratic, very present individual. <\/p>\n<p>Read more <a href=\"https:\/\/uspropertymoves.com\/?p=1438\">\u2018The Last Day\u2019 Review: Alicia Vikander and Victoria Pedretti Shine in a \u2018Mrs. Dalloway\u2019 Reinterpretation About the Perils of Modern Motherhood<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\n\tIn fact, all the performances in this feature debut from director Zach Woods, best known as an actor in comedies including the HBO series <em>Silicon Valley, <\/em>are grounded and sharp. They are the strongest element of a story about nine-year-old Emily (Everly Carganilla), whose grandfather and guardian (Kevyn Morrow) is showing serious signs of dementia. Aubrey Plaza, in a small role, plays an inept social worker who hauls Emily out of her house to Sylvia\u2019s in a nearby New Jersey town.<\/p>\n<div>\n<div>\n<div>\n<h3>\n<p>\t\t\t\t\tThe Accompanist\t\t<\/p>\n<\/h3>\n<div>\n<span>The Bottom Line<\/span><br \/>\n<span><\/p>\n<p>\tA jumble of lovely and twee.<br \/>\n\t<\/span>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<strong>Venue: <\/strong>Tribeca Festival (Spotlight Narrative)<br \/><strong>Cast:<\/strong> Susan Sarandon, Aubrey Plaza, Everly Carganilla, Kevyn Morrow, Emma Farnell-Watson<br \/><strong>Director: <\/strong>Zach Woods<br \/><strong>Writers:<\/strong> Zach Woods, Brandon Gardner<br \/>\n<span><br \/>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t1 hour 50 minutes\t\t\t<\/span>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>\n\tBut Woods, who wrote the screenplay with Brandon Gardner, tries to infuse a deft drama with a wisp of magical realism, which is more problematic. It\u2019s not that those two elements can\u2019t coexist, but that one part works far better than the other here.<\/p>\n<p>\n\tEmily\u2019s story is gripping from the start, as she worries about the loving grandfather who can\u2019t take care of her safely anymore. A near-accident as he drives on a train track, a scene of tense efficiency, alarms even Emily. Alerted by a school nurse, Plaza\u2019s character, Sarah, arrives at the house and, in what she later admits was a panicked moment, brusquely drags Emily to her car and takes her to Sylvia.<\/p>\n<p>\n\tVisually, the film finds a smart balance between the real and fantastic, with cinematography that is crisp and at times just a bit brighter than reality. The production design gives Sylvia\u2019s house, filled with photographs and tchotchkes, an old-fashioned, almost storybook look.<\/p>\n<p>\n\tAnd Sylvia herself is as layered as her cluttered home. When Emily refuses to enter the house, Sylvia just lets her stay outside then finds her in a playground, where they spend the night. She smokes and pulls pranks. She conveniently forgets to send Emily to school. You have to suspend logic to believe in much of this plot, even the realistic elements. The well-meaning but remarkably inept Sarah never clarified whether she or Sylvia would enroll Emily in school. And we see, long before the supposedly astute Sylvia, just when Emily is likely to run away. But Sylvia and Emily develop a charming rapport, and their scenes together have enough wit and ease to make the story work for a while.<\/p>\n<p>Read more <a href=\"https:\/\/uspropertymoves.com\/?p=1436\">How \u2019Off Campus\u2019 Creator Louisa Levy Adapted a Beloved Romance Novel Into a Hit Series<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\n\tIt\u2019s too bad the rocky screenplay spends so much time pointing toward a tragedy in Sylvia\u2019s past before revealing it. That secret is hinted at in the film\u2019s opening scene: a ballet dancer in what is clearly some medical institution performs frantic movements. Here and in later scenes, the dancer Emma Farnell-Watson captures the agony and pain of the character, who we eventually learn is Sylvia\u2019s late daughter, Nadia.<\/p>\n<p>\n\tNadia\u2019s story, used subtly at first, says a lot about why Sylvia might have wanted to foster a child without having to spell that out. Yet the more we learn about her and Sylvia\u2019s grief, the more overwrought the screenplay becomes, and such subtlety vanishes. There are too-neat parallels, as a frequent nervous neck twitch of Emily\u2019s becomes a triggering echo of Nadia\u2019s anorexia.<\/p>\n<p>\n\tThe fantasy element arrives fairly late in the film but is bluntly foreshadowed. The story begins at Halloween and Emily\u2019s grandfather reads her a story about witches. And while the magical realism is the film\u2019s most unusual strand, it is also the weakest. The various scenes detached from reality start out as enigmatic but become head-spinning and confounding. When Sylvia and Emily fly through the night sky, there is a hint it might be a dream. And later in the story when Sylvia thinks of Nadia in dance class, a scene that plays out on screen, it appears Emily can share Sylvia\u2019s memories or dreams or whatever they are. The film strains to open the door to magic, and those episodes land with a thud.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\n<em>The Accompanist<\/em> has some lovely moments. Carganilla makes Emily heartbreaking in the way she finally longs to stay with Sylvia, trying to learn to play the piano to please her, slowly picking out a touching, surprisingly apt phrase from <em>Porgy and Bess<\/em>. But as it unravels, this ambitious film becomes too precious for its own good.<\/p>\n<p>Read more <a href=\"https:\/\/uspropertymoves.com\/?p=1434\">How Pink\u2019s Tony Awards Opening Came Together With Lea Michele, Megan Thee Stallion and Aerial Stunts<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Susan Sarandon and Aubrey Plaza star in Zach Woods&#8217; &#8216;The Accompanist,&#8217; about a wacky, wise foster mother and the 9-year-old girl she takes in.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1439,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[1207,1268,260,477],"class_list":["post-1440","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-interesting","tag-aubrey-plaza","tag-susan-sarandon","tag-tribeca-festival","tag-zach-woods"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.6 - 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