‘“My body, my pad, my ride, my family, my church, my boys, my girls, my porn.” These are the things most important to the smooth talking, slick-haired Jon in the new comedy, Don Jon. With a life that revolves smoothly around these aspects, Jon is perfectly content until he meets a voluptuous blonde and a wise and witty redhead that will completely change his attitude towards life and more specifically, his attitude towards sex.
Joseph Gordon-Levitt, of The Dark Knight Rises and 50/50 fame, directed and starred as Jon in this R-rated film. As a bartender who is addicted to the pornographic realm of the Internet, Jon goes through life thinking no real sex could ever compare to the images and videos available on his small black Mac laptop screen. It isn’t until he locks eyes with the beautiful Barbara Sugarman, played by Scarlett Johansson, that his perception of sex gets turned upside down.
In the beginning, Johansson’s character seems a confident woman who is simply looking for someone to fulfill her desire of having life resemble a romantic movie. However, as they get further into their relationship, her manipulative nature slowly begins to emerge. Barbara expects certain qualities out of a man: an education, a high socioeconomic class, and complete honesty. Therefore, in order to instill those qualities in Jon, sex becomes a manipulation tactic.
Johansson is stellar in her role as Barbara. Her transition from strong and confident, to sweet and concerned, to manipulative, and ultimately disappointed is flawless. The transition is never an obvious switch. The audience is slowly able to pick up on subtle facial expressions and gestures that indicate the behavioral differences. The only downside to her performance is a very awkward and unconvincing New Jersey accent.
As Jon is pushed further and further under Barbara’s thumb throughout the movie, he becomes more deeply attached to his pornography, and forced to watch in secret, as Barbara does not approve. It isn’t until the witty redhead Esther, played by Julianne Moore, catches Jon watching porn on his cell phone that he realizes how he has been living is not healthy.
Moore’s character has the most depth of any performance in the film. The character has a history that makes her daily living a struggle, and Moore captures that struggle brilliantly. As she helps Jon realize that sex is about a mutual connection more so than individual satisfaction, the audience can see both characters pull themselves out of their darker phases.
While Gordon-Levitt, Moore, and Johansson steal the majority of the movie, the addition of Tony Danza as Jon’s father Jon Sr. pushes the movie to an even higher level. The father-son fights are played out in such a way that viewers could be convinced that Danza and Gordon-Levitt are actually related. It served as another intriguing dimension of an already thought-provoking movie.
Don Jon is most definitely worth the price of a movie ticket. For any woman curious about a man’s relationship with porn or any man curious about which female expectations are unrealistic, this is the movie to see.
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