Movie: Daddio (2023), limited release in 2024
Starring: Dakota Johnson, Sean Penn
Written by: Kirk Dulin

FUN FACTS:

• Dakota Johnson was cast in the movie  first. 
• The casting team envisioned a “Sean Penn type” for the role of the taxi cab driver. Hearing this, Dakota took the script to her neighbor…the ACTUAL Sean Penn.
• Most scenes of Dakota and Johnson in the cab were filmed on a soundstage with an LED Projection wall surrounding them…which completely fooled me. 

Daddio is a Unicorn in a Sea of Sequels

There’s a specific type of goosebumps you get when you share a movie with your friends and they LOVE it. Bonus points if they not only love it, but they can’t stop talking about it. Bonus BONUS points if NOT only can they NOT stop talking about it, but they begin to share it with anyone who will listen.

“Daddio” is that movie. 

I can almost guarantee that this shot-in-chronological order movie will NOT be an Oscars contender, but it doesn’t have to be. The most surprising movies affect us in ways we could never prepare for, and a golden statuette, though merited, is not the only scale to grade a film.

Shaking off her VERY public scrutiny of “Madame Webb – GUILTY – Dakota does what Dakota does best and steps into a very stripped down (no 50 Shades pun intended), very real character. If you’re unfamiliar, Johnson has delivered wildly successful acting performances in films like “The Peanut Butter Falcon”, “Cha Cha Real Smooth”, and “The Lost Daughter”. The common thread? Johnson has a unique compass to express genuine vulnerabilities we wouldn’t dare reveal in the real world. 

THE SET UP:

As we are introduced to Johnson’s character, Girlie (we never learn her real name), she naturally exchanges those niceties we are all trained up to give to a stranger: “How are you?” “How’s your day?” “How many passengers have you had today?”

Sean Penn, the cab driver named Clark, initially agrees to the norms of this dialogue, “Where to?” “How was your flight?” “Business or Pleasure?”

THE SLOW BURN:

Penn’s character, a true straight shooter, patiently allows the passenger to get these questions out of their system. He studies them top to bottom – their body language, their energy level, their specific word choice. He uses these life tools to detect if his customer needs a REAL conversation. He also knows that the conversation is an open contract, subject to close at any moment and without notice. Ultimately, a cab driver who sits in a car all day, either in silence or filling the time speaking about NOTHING, craves that human connection. For Penn, it’s not a game, it’s a need in his life, and he wants to remind people it exists in them too. 

For our viewing pleasure, Johnson’s character is at a very active crossroads, and opening up to a stranger may be her best bet in navigating her next move. 

Writer and Director Christy Hall slowly dials these characters’ static emotions from the dark shadows of the JFK Airport to an overlit construction gridlock. With each passing mile marker, Penn tests Johnson’s emotional availability. 

“It’s nice you’re not on your phone. [To] see a human not plugged in. It says a lot about you”, Penn says to Johnson.

That phrasing is SO thoughtful for (2) reasons:

1. If you are seeing “Daddio” in a movie theater, you are required not to be plugged in – Phones Off or on Silent. This allows the audience to simultaneously connect with each of these characters for completely different reasons.
2. We all outwardly or secretly crave to be freed from our tiny black mirrors. When we see and hear this play out in a movie, our brain chemistry lights up. We’ve now received permission to unplug as a positive character trait, AND we’ve been validated to our own inner monologue.

That phrase sets up the rest of the movie. There won’t be a high speed chase, or international espionage. You won’t see either of them leap off of mountain while riding a motorcycle or have a premonition of the future and time travel to try and stop it (sorry, Dakota). 

You will see two people who have lived different lives meet by happenstance, and share their moment in time together discussing their past, presents, and futures. 

THE PAYOFF:

A two-person only movie is not a new concept. Many have come before (“My Dinner with Andre”, “Moon”, “Before Sunrise”) and many will come again. It’s easy to categorize a movie by its bones, but it’s easier to dismiss the stereotype when the film has substance. “Daddio” easily surpasses its framework and becomes, at times,  an engaging tennis match of shared or opposing ideas from the front and the back of the cab.

One of the most buzzworthy pieces of this movie is that it was filmed on a soundstage instead of the street. I am usually one who can call this out from a mile away (see Netflix’s 2024 “Trigger Finger”), but I was genuinely fooled. The LED Background screen is completely believable as a real setting, along with the stunning sound design and committed actors in the cab.

If you love starting a chain reaction among your friends and family for life-changing movies (Here’s a starter pack: “Sing Street”, “Brigsby Bear”, “Room”, “Causeway”, “End of Watch”, “Cinema Paradiso”, “Dinner Rush”, “In & of Itself”), then “Daddio” is for you.

Some movies keep us coming back for more, and drive us to rewatch it dozens of times. They keep us curious about what “moves” us. They keep us eager to sit in the empty theater as the credits roll. They keep us captivated in a moment. They keep us safe for a short while.

9.0/10 kernels