Film review: Maggie’s Plan is a cut above Hollywood’s usual, formulaic romcoms

Maggie’s Plan subverts the traditional romcom structure – sort of, without ever straying too far from the rules of the genre – by having the main character spend half of the film trying to get her husband back together with his ex-wife.

Ethan Hawke and Greta Gerwig in Maggie’s Plan. Jon Pack, Hall Monitor, Inc / Sony Pictures Classics

Maggie’s Plan

Director: Rebecca Miller

Stars: Greta Gerwig, Ethan Hawke, Julianne Moore

Three stars

Maggie (Greta Gerwig) is a bit of a control freak and underachiever. She did OK at college, she has an OK job as an academic – she’s mainly OK. But that doesn’t mean that things will be OK for the people she comes in contact with.

Maggie wants a child, you see, and decides to go it on her own, through artificial insemination, so that she can remain in full control of the process – though her decisions leave some questions about whether she could use some help or guidance.

Her circle of friends mainly include fellow university anthropologists, which may seem unlikely – but does at least mark the first romantic comedy I watched in which the fetishisation of commodities during the dying days of the American empire was a recurring theme.

Along the way, Maggie unexpectedly falls in love with John (Ethan Hawke) whose marriage to Georgette (Julianne Moore) is crumbling.

Maggie's Plan delivers a perfectly enjoyable couple of hours. It subverts the traditional romcom structure – sort of, without ever straying too far from the rules of the genre – by having the main character spend half of the film trying to get her husband back together with his ex-wife.

And it is pretty funny, in parts, mostly thanks to the children of the main characters, in particular Mina Sundwell, who is something of a revelation in this film, as Justine, a teenage girl lumbered with parents who are clearly less than ideal.

Hawke is in familiar territory, portraying another attractive, but largely aimless, man. He’s been playing that sort of role very well throughout his career. On this occasion he’s writing a novel which, if his ex-wife is to be believed, is not very good.

Moore, meanwhile, has a strange accent that is never properly explained, but puts in a great performance regardless, as you might expect, particularly in the scenes in which she meets her ex’s younger replacement. The cast also includes notables such as Bill Hader, Maya Rudolph and Wallace Shawn.

All in all, it is a perfectly entertaining, if unremarkable, film. It possibly doesn’t quite deliver on all it promises as an “anti-romcon” of sorts – but it definitely offers a subversive antidote to what you expect from the genre.