Benny & Joon

Another of the movies that I got a chance to record during one of the free preview weekends is Benny & Joon. It's going to be on several times over the next week, with the first being tomorrow at 6:20 PM on HBO Comedy.

Benny (Aidan Quinn) is a mechanic working at a repair shop in Spokane, WA. He lives with his younger, but adult sister Joon (Mary Stuart Masterson) in a house that frankly seems much too big for Benny to be able to pay for on his salary. (A brief flashback scene reveals their parents were killed in a car crash when Benny was an adolescent; I'll guess the house was paid off and there was enough of an inheritance to help support Joon.) Joon calls the shop looking for Benny to pick up a bunch of stuff that make it sounds like Joon is pregnant and having cravings.

But she's not. Instead, she's got a mental illness of some sort (never explicitly stated), which leads to all sorts of odd behavior like this. That's the mild stuff; the bad stuff includes temper tantrums that cause every housekeeper in town to quit working for Benny and Joon; apparently they're also supposed to be Joon's minder, and who could do that?

Having to be Joon's keeper has also been terrible for Benny. He's met a nice young woman in Ruthie (Julianne Moore), but doesn't feel he can start a relationship because of what it might to do Joon. Meanwhile, Joon's psychiatrist, Dr. Garvey (C.C.H. Pounder), has been suggesting to Benny that perhaps now would be the right time to put Joon in a group home, which Benny is also reluctant to do.

Benny's only joy in life is the regular poker game he and his friend have, in which they wager odd items rather than money. One day Joon asks to join in, and one of Benny's friends raises with a rather odd proposition. The friend's cousin Sam (Johnny Depp) has been pawned off on the friend. Sam is eccentric and semiliterate, and the friend would like to move the friend on. So, if Joon loses the poker hand, she and Benny have to take Sam in.

Sure enough Joon loses. Sam is a fan of old movies, and has odd ways of doing things, like using the iron to cook grilled cheese. But he seems to have a bit more of a positive influence on Joon than any of the other housekeepers. The problem is that Sam finds himself falling in love with Joon, and the feeling might be mutual. Benny is understandably uncomforable with this, fearing Sam is trying to take advantage of Joon, and it threatens to break up the whole threesome.

I had only known Benny and Joon from the song that it resurrected, 500 Miles (I'm Gonna Be) which was actually recorded several years before the movie. But for the most part I liked the movie. Most people will think about Masterson's and Depp's performances as the two less-than-stable people, but I found myself thinking a lot about Quinn's as the protector of Joon who can't really bring himself to talk about his sister's mental illness. I do wonder, however, just how well-kept a secret it would be from the community if Joon weren't able to support herself.

By the same token, one other minor problem I had with the movie was the ending, which I felt was a bit pat and unrealistic. Sam was also written as a bit too quirky at times. But overall, it doesn't detract from the rest of Benny & Joon, which is well worth watching.

Benny & Joon did get a DVD release, but it seems to be out of print. However, it also seems to be available on Amazon's streaming service.