Posted yesterday at 10:00 a.m.
Physically, he has a bit of Nanni Moretti, a bit of Xavier Dolan too. At 25, Cooper Raiff is now making his second offering, two years after being revealed to the world of independent cinema thanks to Shithouse.
Winner of the Audience Award at the Sundance Festival, Cha Cha Real Smooth could now bring the filmmaker to the major leagues, especially since Apple TV +, the first platform to win the Oscar for best film thanks to CODAhas acquired the rights to broadcast its new feature film for the tidy sum of 15 million dollars.
Cha Cha Real Smooth begins with a flashback where it is made clear that Andrew, the character played by Cooper Raiff himself as an adult, has a knack for falling in love with women older than him. It was true when he was 12; it still is 10 years later. The main axis of the story is this feeling that Andrew develops towards Domino (Dakota Johnson), very young mother of a preteen girl (Vanessa Burghardt) suffering from an autism spectrum disorder.
Noticed thanks to his talent for setting the mood in the celebrations surrounding an obligatory rite of passage in the Jewish religion, Andrew quickly becomes called upon as an animator, he who, however, is a little lost after graduating from university. Raiff thus lingers to describe the daily life of his character, from his work in a restaurant to his family life, passing, of course, by the parties he hosts, where he is not immune to a skid.
As in several films of this nature, the filmmaker relies above all on dialogues – often brilliant – whose writing is however too much felt at times. That said, the characters are endearing. Cooper Raiff displays a beautiful screen presence, and Dakota Johnson, opposite him, offers a performance as subtle as it is vibrant.
Cha Cha Real Smooth is presented exclusively on Apple TV+.
Drama
Cha Cha Real Smooth
Cooper Raiff
Starring Cooper Raiff, Dakota Johnson, Evan Assante
1:47 a.m.