Review: 'My Salinger Year' Showcases an Excellent Sigourney Weaver

It is an absolute treat to watch Sigourney Weaver playing a slightly-less-over-the-top version of Miranda Priestly (Meryl Streep in "Devil Wears Prada") in Philippe Falardeau's charming film "My Salinger Year." Her complex, nuanced turn as literary agent Phyllis Westberg is a sobering reminder that Weaver has never won an Oscar. Whether she will be recognized for this film is up to the Awards gods, but suffice to say she is more than worthy, in a cinematic effort that may too-easily be dismissed as by the book.

"My Salinger Year" is based on the real experience of Joanna Rakoff's one year working for Westberg, whose number one client at the time (1995) was the complicated, reclusive J.D. Salinger. Joanna is played by the gifted Margaret Qualley ("Once Upon a Time...In Hollywood"), who is so endearing she could make watching paint dry a delight as long as she was in the frame with the paint.

Full disclosure, I am a sucker for literary films and I buy into the overused tropes – the writer who finds his/her voice or gains inspiration from (fill in the blank). So I dove into "My Salinger Year" with aplomb... and I was not disappointed. Even Debussy's overused "Clair de Lune" gave me goosebumps.

The basic plot has young aspiring poet, Joanna, snagging a job at Westberg's super old school lit agency in late 1995 (the use of computers is verboten), after claiming she had no interest in being a writer, and being placed in charge of Salinger's fan mail. Apparently Salinger stopped reading his mail in the early '60s and insisted that they all be returned with a standard letter from that point onward. But because of certain frightening incidents, they also need to be read and scrutinized first. (John Lennon assassin Mark David Chapman was arrested holding a copy of "Catcher in the Rye.")

One of the wonderful imaginative touches in the film has to do with letters read aloud by fans relating to the infamous "Catcher" protagonist, Holden Caulfield, as well as Salinger's other work. This device builds to a wonderful bus scene, and continues and converges as the film proceeds to its conclusion. "Never Rarely Sometimes Always" actor Théodore Pellerin is featured nicely in these sequences.

In addition to the glorious Weaver and the fabulous Qualley, the indie boast excellent work by Brian F. O'Byrne, Colm Feore, and the usually gorgeous Douglas Booth, frumped up to create an idea of socialist angst.

My one real issue with the film is that I wish it had spent a bit more time developing Joanna as a believable writer, having us feel some passion for the craft on her end. We are told often enough, but actually seeing it would have been a boon.

"My Salinger Year" asks questions that don't have easy answers. For instance, whether the move from literary to digital is, indeed, progress when it comes to creating future classics. And, yes, the expected theme of discovering one's passion and pursuing it regardless is omnipresent, but so is a not so often presented idea of nurturing artists instead of coddling them (and there is a tremendous difference).

Near the end of "Salinger" is a lovely scene between the two female protags where Westberg gives us a clue as to how her tough skin formed. It's a revealing moment, and one that bonds these two very different women who share a fervor for the artistic expression of the written word.

"My Salinger Year" opens in theaters and on demand on March 5, 2021.