Daddio
On her ride home from the airport to midtown New York city, a young woman (Dakota Johnson) finds herself in a taxi cab with a driver (Sean Penn) that has an interesting outlook on life. As their conversation weaves into life lessons and relationship talk, what transpires is a healing and deep conversation for both. For Johnson’s character, it’s the fatherly advice and guidance from this stranger that might just be the chicken soup for the soul she needs, and for Penn’s character it might be the absolution he needs in a world that’s changing all around him.
Written and Directed by newcomer Christy Hall, the whole film uses the premise of the drive home as the carrier for what feels like an well developed One act, a piece that clearly has beats and break points, but explores each character’s flaws and victories to a faultless point and delivers a rich and incredibly thoughtful capture as two random strangers manage to bear their soul to each other in a very real way. And, while there are a few writing crutches or “tools” that Hall relies on to drive her narrative, such as score keeping in storytelling which never quite seems to land as genuine, this is a minor offense in relation to the overall performances which allow Penn and Johnson to generate some of the most heartfelt, relatable, and emotionally complex moments on screen to touch the viewer in a significant way. Bottom line, at one hour and forty one minutes of run time, the film sits as the perfect length for this duo to not overstay their welcome and deliver some knockout performances, smelling Oscar nods from here. Daddio is rated R.