'Coup!' review: Peter Sarsgaard gets delightfully slimy
There are so many annoying human behaviors — willful ignorance has topped my personal list the last eight years or so — but hypocrisy has to be among the worst.
And it is front and center in Joseph Schuman and Austin Stark’s film “Coup!” It’s a dark comedy about class warfare, government overreach and infectious disease.
It’s a lot more fun than that sounds.
That’s due in large part to the performances of Peter Sarsgaard and Billy Magnussen, though Sarah Gadon is a kind of secret weapon. It’s set in 1918 as flu rages around the world; any similarities to the COVID-19 pandemic are purely intentional, and a little on the nose. No matter. It works.
What is 'Coup!' about?
The film opens with Floyd Monk (Sarsgaard) shaving. Well, not Floyd Monk exactly. The unfortunate Floyd would appear to be dead in the next room, a bullet in his head, while the new version shaves his beard to look a little more like the real Floyd’s ID photo. He’s stealing Floyd’s identity so that he can take his place as the new chef at a mansion on Egg Island in New York.
The mansion belongs to Jay Horton (Magnussen), a newspaper columnist — or, more accurately, a muckraker, who writes screeds attacking President Woodrow Wilson for how he is handling the flu outbreak, or not handling it. Jay rails about government inaction, attacking Wilson, demanding that the country be shut down to stem the tide of infection.
Jay is gaining traction in the progressive movement, perhaps even a political candidate. His dispatches describe in detail the protests in New York City, the police brutality visited upon them, the lament of the poor and downtrodden, to whom he refers to as “we.” Even the great Upton Sinclair (Fisher Stevens) wants to write about him, and further his career.
That Jay is ensconced in a mansion on an isolated estate, safe from the flu, an utter hypocrite, bothers him not at all. He’s drunk on power, and occasionally on the Scotch he denies his servants … er, staff, as he insists they be called.
He is the perfect example of what would become limousine liberals, donning the mantle of the poor and needy while keeping the staff out of his private swimming pool. His wife Julie (Sarah Gadon), also a writer, indulges his whims as she takes care of their children and tends to the staff.
Then Floyd enters this world. He’s not a free spirit, exactly. More like an opportunistic grifter, and boy is Sarsgaard good at playing this kind of character, with more than a hint of danger behind every disingenuous smile. Could you trust this guy at dinner in real life? Soon Floyd has the rest of the staff demanding that their salaries be doubled, has them moved from the meager staff quarters into the mansion, even — gasp — swimming in Jay’s pool.
Peter Sarsgaard vs. Billy Magnusson is a delight
There are plenty of films about shortening the gap between classes, some better than this. “Coup!” is no “Trading Places,” for instance. But it is more political, at least more obviously so. And its politics, while not exactly all over the place, are in two places (at least) at once, decrying the hypocrisy of the rich while giving a strong nod toward the economic and social damage that arrive alongside forced closures.
In short, everything is everybody’s fault. I like that approach.
If Sarsgaard is preternaturally adept at playing smarmy, untrustworthy characters — though sometimes they have a greater motive than self-interest — then Magnussen was born to play rich clods who have lost the plot, if they ever knew it in the first place. It’s a delight to watch them face off.
But it’s Gadon whose Julie, Jay’s wife, who surprises. There are many chapters to a life, she explains to a surprised Floyd at one point. And a few to “Coup!” as well.
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'Coup!' 3.5 stars
Great ★★★★★ Good ★★★★
Fair ★★★ Bad ★★ Bomb ★
Directors: Joseph Schuman, Austin Stark.
Cast: Peter Sarsgaard, Billy Magnussen, Sarah Gadon.
Rating: Not rated.
How to watch: In theaters Friday, Aug. 2.
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This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: 'Coup!' review: Peter Sarsgaard battles Billy Magnussen and the flu