C'mon C'mon 2021

C’mon C’mon is tender, quiet, and honest. I’ll admit the black and white format made it hard for me to get attached at first. Maybe because I see life in color, and this felt drained of it. Still, there’s something about the lens choice that saves it. The shallow focus and creamy bokeh create intimacy, as if we’re watching memories through fogged glass. Every frame looks soft, nostalgic, and human. The score is also intimate, melancholic, and deeply personal. It reminded me of The Time Traveler’s Wife soundtrack. The piano and strings don’t rise to tell you what to feel, they stay low. The film almost plays like a documentary, a study of how children see the world. Joaquin Phoenix’s character tries to understand his nephew, but Jesse (Woody Norman) is wild energy trapped in confusion. I’ll be honest, I was annoyed by him. Spoiled brat energy. If I were Johnny (Joaquin Phoenix), I couldn’t handle it either. And that’s what the film quietly asks: how far would you go for your family member (in this case, his sister) and how far can patience stretch when the child isn’t yours? What lingers is that interview moment with one of the kids saying, “Someone being there to understand you, but still not understand you.” That line stuck with me. It’s how children navigate this grown up world, always trying to express, but being mistranslated by adults. It’s heartbreaking because it’s true. We all want to be seen, but not everyone who sees us truly gets us. Gaby Hoffman as Viv frustrated me more than anyone. Why would you prioritize your sick husband over your own child? That scene made me angry because as a parent, I can’t imagine making that choice. My wife should never have to choose between me and our kids. I need her to prioritize our kids, not me. Then that song, “Anyone Who Knows What Love Is” by Irma Thomas, plays and it’s perfect. I remember hearing it in Black Mirror Season 1, carrying that same melancholic tone of loving despite brokenness. “You can blame me, try to shame me… still I’ll care for you.” Bagay dito because it’s a form of tolerance. “You can run around, even put me down… still I’ll be there for you.” The phrase “will understand” implies that she believes her actions reflect a deeper grasp of love than what the world can see. “The world may think I’m foolish, they can’t see you like I can” asserts that only someone who truly knows love will understand. That’s what makes the song powerful: a gritty persistence in hardship. “Anyone who knows what love is will understand” becomes an anthem of pure, unwavering love, even though love isn’t always glamorous or easy. It’s a song about endurance, about loving when it no longer makes sense. When Johnny reads Star Child by Claire A. Nivola, it says: “Over the years, you will try to make sense of that happy, sad, full, empty, always-shifting life you’re in.” That cuts deep. That’s the struggle of being alive. Moving forward in this life while experiencing all sorts of things. A roller coaster of emotions. One moment you think you have everything, then the next, you feel like everything you’re doing is pointless. But what sealed the film for me was Jesse’s speech about him and his mother: “No matter how much we love each other, we’ll never know everything about each other.” It really made sense to me as someone who isn’t very open with my mother — and vice versa. We know we love each other, but there are so many things we still don’t know about one another. C’mon C’mon doesn’t try to give meaning to life but it just sits with you while you try to learn it. It’s soft, flawed, frustrating, and real. Like love. Like family. Like growing up in a world that never stops shifting.