These thoughts on Michael Haneke's beautiful study of ageing I left unfinished in January, forgot about and have now rediscovered. Here they are, as a short review.
In their eighties, Anne (Emmanuelle Riva) and Georges (Jean-Louis Trintignant) live a comfortable life together in Paris. They were music teachers and they are still lovers of the piano and its music. This is Anne and Georges at the start of Amour, both captivating already. Then, Anne suffers a stroke and the film becomes a study of what happens next, as life inevitably unfolds. The relationship she shares with Georges is transformed and shaken, there is daily horror and indignity, difficult family relationships are exposed alongside reminders of past success.
Amour is a masterful film from director Michael Haneke, bleak but intensely emotional. There are moments which are frightening, especially that first attack, and Anne's continual decline is shockingly rapid. And though the film develops gradually, the pace is never slow. This is riveting cinema, and at its centre is the astounding acting of Riva and Trintignant. Meanwhile, dramatic impetus comes unobtrusively from the flash-forward of the opening scene – how did Anne's corpse come to be alone, undiscovered?
Haneke shows us human spirit as both resilient and fragile. The meaning of deepest love is first suggested to be, and then strongly tested as, a duty towards the person to whom we are attached and share our lives. Amour's uncompromising approach is underpinned by a fearless gaze at the response to a natural but unfathomable reality. The question at the root of the film is: what, in the end, does love entail? Instinctive protection perhaps, or an understanding of need. Haneke does not answer the question – in fact, I suspect he believes we can never know. We just have to wait; it is terrifying and wonderful.
Django Unchained hits us blasting and smirking, bestrewn
with Morricone and enormous type. This is unmistakably a Quentin Tarantino concoction.
But this time, 'unmistakable' suggests a lack of
surprise. Now, Tarantino cannot be boring and Django Unchained is
characteristically wild and precise in its execution(s). This is the story
of a German bounty hunter (Christoph Waltz) and a slave called Django (Jamie
Foxx), who travel through the Old South to rescue Django's wife (Kerry
Washington) from the control of a plantation owner (Leonardo DiCaprio) and his
sinister house-slave (Samuel L. Jackson). It is entertaining, of course.
However, whilst always funny, brutal or smart, it does not
often enough mash all three together with the imagination of Reservoir Dogs or
Inglourious Basterds. They still coincide in key scenes, for instance the first
appearance of Waltz. He approaches two slavers and their 'property', and what
follows is a shock of amusing words ("Last chance, fancy pants") and cleverly
plotted mayhem. Waltz is bright and strangely convincing and, although Schultz
is not quite a match for Basterds' Col. Landa, he carries much of the film, taking
on its humour and human flaws and virtues.
Meanwhile, DiCaprio and Jackson inhabit Tarantino's line
between evil and charm. The director knows so well how to seduce us with such
characters. That line he paints is thick and lurid, unlike that etched in black
by Wilder and Hitchcock, and from it his films get their drive (certainly those
of the last decade). Here we have DiCaprio's sickening 'mandingo' fights, dogs
and hammer, all surveyed with a grin; the film kicks accordingly. Both
characters (DiCaprio's monstrous Calvin Candie and Jackson's monstrous Stephen)
get great and gleeful moments.
Tarantino has set out to emulate the spaghetti western in
Django Unchained, taking it to the South and piercing it with slavery. Doubt
starts to surface. Humour amid the bloodiest of violence, a feature of the
genre, does not always work (the bags-as-hoods skit raises a laugh, but feels out
of place). There are stylistic quirks and vintage Morricone cuts on the
soundtrack – but you had those in your movies already, Quentin. Are we to take
them at face value here? Having the spaghetti served up in a real-life, actual,
mock spaghetti western breaks the surprise. Then once Jamie Foxx starts to get
his Kill Bill on, those quirks seem to dissipate anyway; so by the time we
reach the huge set pieces and shoot-outs in the film’s final act, our sense of
place – Mississippi and Italy – has been lost.
Foxx is Django. The D is silent (this is a cool character). Django
is a sharp shooter and a sharp dresser. He is a man who loves his wife and is
bitterly injured by her foul treatment, which is atrociously believable. His initial
tussles with Candie are highlights and allow us to believe that at the centre
of Tarantino's audacious story is a fresh character capable of real power
and justice. But something is lost as he starts to deliver explosive revenge. He
is a cool character. He is an icon, a symbol, a Quentin Tarantino concoction.
Django is a vessel for violent catharsis – here to talk funny, act brutal and
look smart. For justice to be done, for African Americans to be emancipated on
the screen, he must be more than that. But it is entertaining, of course.
RidleyScotthasreturned,tocinemascreensandtogloriespast.HeoffersusPrometheus,aprequelofsortstothemagnificentAlien. The hype has been big: itremained unclearquitehowdirectlythenewfilmwouldrelatetotheold,butthetrailerwastantalizing.Onarrival,Prometheusis quite its own film. It is alsomostlyasuccess – alarge,boldandengagingaction-horror. That it misfires on several counts turns out not to matter too much. The fun outweighs the over-egged statement of themes and sketchy characters.
Fassbender-bot is not sketchy.
Intriguing archaeological discoveries are discovered. Maybe they indicate that humans originate from a distant planet – the crew of Prometheus has been sent into space to look into it. The scientific team is headed by the religious Elizabeth Shaw (Noomi Rapace). She is in a relationship with another scientist, Charlie Holloway (Logan Marshall-Green). In actual charge is Meredith Vickers (Charlize Theron), who is an important person from the company which has sent the ship out. Keeping everything running smoothly is the gloriously blond robot-butler David (Michael Fassbender-bot).
Alongside this, the story raises some big questions about the origins of humanity. Unfortunately,this develops intoPrometheus' most damaging weakness. It is very disappointing, since the film could have been lifted to impressive heights by such themes, were they handled well. But the big questions lose their impact, being repeatedly and blatantly laidoutbeforeus.
It does not help that most of the characters are not particularly interesting, with little added to the stock roles for the actors to enjoy. Rapace and Marshall-Green do not make much of an impression, the tech guys are tech guys, and Charlize Theron plays a bitchy bitch. For reasons mostly unclear, she refuses to like or help anyone in any way; it does not matter who they are or what they want or need. It is uninteresting, although Theron is good. Guy Pearce's casting, meanwhile, is simply bizarre.
But there is hope. Fassbender-botiswonderful as David. He is an android to embrace: rather too perfect, blankly charming and sinister too. Does he have his own motives? With an Aryan sheen, he consciously (and a little campily) emulates the airs and hair of Peter O'Toole in Lawrence of Arabia. I am only annoyed that the film occasionally requires him to speak in Alienese (so foreign-sounding, we are encouraged to think). But then he utters such lines as "It's quite all right," and we cheer in our seats. He's so beautifully polite! I love Fassbender-bot.
It is quickly apparent that Prometheus will not touch Alien. But the grandeur of the attempt is admirable and it does not tip into folly, despite the creakily exposed shot at loftiness. Prometheus does not quite succeed through its philosophy or humanity; ultimately, it is the spectacle and the android which make it worthwhile.
François van Heerden (Deon Lotz) is a married Afrikaans businessman, whose ordered life masks secretive homosexuality. When he meets Christian (Charlie Keegan), the handsome son of an old friend, he is fixated. But ugly prejudices and shame constrict him and theresultis confusing torment, threatening to explode. Writer-director Oliver Hermanus' film Beauty (the first Afrikaans language film to compete at Cannes) is an intimate study of repression. Obsessive behaviour, anger and bigotry are all just beneath François' bland surface. It is suggested that there have been violent outbursts in his past.
More than anything however, we pity François. Beauty is slow-paced and thoughtful, offering the time we need to sympathize whilst we despise his actions. This can come at the price of dramatic flow, and occasionally the film is in danger of halting. But Lotz's simmering performance holds Beauty together, powered by tight close-ups and a steady gaze (from both Lotz and Hermanus). It is a measured and convincing portrayal of a deeply conflicted man, thrashing out for a happiness he does not understand, as emphasized by the elegantly effective final scene.
Hermanus has a keen sense for beauty indeed and the film is carefully composed and subtly lit. Several taut scenes quietly unfurl in the evening by lamplight, in the bedroom or around a dining table; muted blues and greens dominate the screen. Sustained long shots are poised and exteriors are stark with heat. From the start, Francois' voyeurism is matched by wide, intensely focused shots, with distant dialogue unheard. The beauty is carefully underlined by a delicate musical score from Ben Ludik (alongside his Invisible Nightclub project).
There is also a dose of awkward humour. When François secretly meets with a group of middle-aged men for sex, there is an embarrassing scene of introduction and beer-drinking before they may begin. It is reminiscent of Mike Leigh, even if the milieu is a tad different. Bigotry stings all the fiercer when it comes: there is a searing flash of racism and objections against "faggots" (a defensive machismo operates here). The subsequent attempt at casual conversation is grimly funny.
Without this, Beauty's slow burningdesperation could end up simply bleak. There are moments which bear this out. A pounding club scene is potent, but almost literally sickening; cathartic sexual violence pushes us even closer to the limit. But Hermanus tackles his subject bravely and largely with restraint, as reflected in Lotz's central performance. From this restraint, Beauty gains its power.
Meryl Streep won her third Oscar and much else for the leading role, but The Iron Lady attracted mild controversy on its release. An old woman struggling with dementia, Margaret Thatcher talks to her dead husband Denis, and recalls her life and work. The depiction of mental ill health was criticized as disrespectful by a smattering of Tories, including some who had even seen the film. Streep points out that this says more about our discomfort with mental frailty, and wonders whether there would have been outcry if Thatcher had, say, a problem with her lungs.
Don't panic, her lungs are fine.
What of the film? Streep gives a remarkable performance, particularly as the elderly Thatcher (in a magical feat of make-up). Mannerisms and impersonation are contained within a wonderfully convincing portrayal of a mind and body gradually failing with age. And the controversy is ill-founded. These scenes, especially those earlier in the film, are the most interesting by far. From here, the acting, structure and mildly daring concept could combine to produce an absorbing, intimate biopic.
Sadly, the interest dissipates much too quickly as we are soon shunted around snapshots of Thatcher’s career. It starts with a perfunctory glimpse of her childhood, Oxford education and early romance with Denis. There is some strong writing from Abi Morgan, which foreshadows later moments in office and in old age. But Thatcher’s ambition and aspirations are presented cosily and nostalgically, so that there is no real impact, and any insight is facile. It also seems lightweight because it all flashes by so quickly, no scene lasting more than a few minutes.
More Heseltine needed. Ouch.
This is symptomatic of the film as a whole, and ultimately what damages it most. We rattle through a unique career at high speed, striving to cover every key event. Moments that should be revealing, such as the decision to sink the Belgrano, vanish before genuine intrigue can develop. We must move on to the 1983 election; we must jump to the present day once more (if only to be reminded that Mark Thatcher is a tosser – there really is no need). Director Phyllida Lloyd lacks patience and faith, even with good writing and acting at hand.
It means we get no grasp on Thatcher beyond a basic history lesson (the stock footage is the most enlightening), and often only the merest hints at her relationships with family, colleagues and adversaries. Anthony Head and Olivia Colman, as Geoffrey Howe and Carol Thatcher, have the best interaction with Streep, but Jim Broadbent’s hectoring ghost-Denis soon becomes annoying. Meanwhile, Richard E. Grant’s circling vulture by the name of Michael Heseltine is near-ridiculous and Michael Foot is not referred to by name once. Even the mighty Meryl suffers from the scattered structure, robbed of dramatic momentum; come the Poll Tax, power-mad Thatcher just seems daft. She even momentarily reminded me of Edina Monsoon.
Margaret Thatcher was certainly never daft. She had conviction and claws. Despite the best efforts of the actors and make-up department, these are attributes lacking in Lloyd’s film. Poor Tilda notwithstanding, the award season adulation for Streep was deserved. But her generous performance serves an unworthy whole – and that's not how the Thatcher story goes.
Following Speech Therapy was not going to be easy for Speech Debelle. That album won the Mercury Prize in 2009, but its disappointing sales led to a spat with her record label. They now seem to have made amends, and Speech's second album has arrived. She sounds confident and her music has moved forward, often offering a tougher response to the intimate jazz–hip hop of before.
Having so much fun, she's a new age thespian
The singles Studio Backpack Rap and I’m with It are marvellous; both are catchy and immediate dancing tunes. The cracking drums and synths of Studio Backpack Rap provide a driving background to Speech’s excited delivery (including a hilarious lesbian/thespian rhyme). It opens the album with a blast and is the highlight of the whole record. The four-on-the-floor beat which breaks out in the final minute is an irresistible invitation to dance, a genius coda to my new favourite song.
Meanwhile, I’m with It has an upbeat disco-soul vibe. It claps and sings, bringing a welcome breath of fresh air to an often downbeat album. But while nothing else can match it for exuberance, there is plenty to embrace among the more subdued songs. In particular, Blaze Up a Fire fascinates, with its relaxed groove and changes of gear.
It features Roots Manuva and Realism, and its call-to-arms lyrics turned out to be so prescient of the riots in England last August that Debelle released the song on the internet as the news broke. She had on her hands a perfect encapsulation of that specific time, noting in her explanation of the free release, “These young people are not aliens dropped down from outer space on Friday night.”
Following this, the sweeping strings and spacious production of Elephant in the Living Room lend a nocturnal trip hop feel to its break-up story, and X Marks the Spot is spiked with electric guitar fuzz and a dub-like beat. After the power of Studio Backpack Rap, this sound is what characterizes the first half of Freedom of Speech; the mood is low-key, but there is a hidden edge, in both music and words.
The edge is dulled by Angels Wings. Its acoustic sound is reminiscent of Debelle's debut, but lacks the skittering jazz tint which lifted that album. Here, the sound is soft but doesn't move with the emotional weight the personal words deserve. More than anything, at the climax we are admiring the drumming (which is great throughout the whole album). Coming as it does after a run of slow-burning tracks, the momentum is lost.
I'm with It notwithstanding, the second half of the album is then less engaging than the first. Despite Collapse's menacing, piano-heavy backing, Speech's rhymes come off as naive, as she takes on environmental catastrophe and the evils of oil. There are some amusing barbs (“You'd better call some Ray Mears quick, son”), but what prevails is anger without heft. The sound of Eagle Eye directly continues that of Collapse, this time sticking it to the Man. It's good, but by this time things are starting to get wearing.
But at the end, the blissed-out Sun Dog lets in a ray of light. It shuffles along, with Rhodes piano and cello rising from the mist. The quick-fire verses also give Speech a liberating chance to show off her vocal skill. The cathartic and crashing ending feels unnecessary, but it's one of the most beautiful tracks on the album, leaving us with a high.
Speech Debelle has made some great music here. Hers is a promising, maturing talent, and Freedom of Speech is an exciting album. I shall be listening closely to whatever comes next.
By the time Kate Winslet is thrashing tulips against her hosts' coffee table, she has reached the drunken nadir of a middle class nightmare. Two couples have torn themselves and each other apart, sliding from clipped politeness to sniping to screaming. There has been bickering and insult, there has been projectile vomit. The horrifying descent is the basis of Roman Polanski's enjoyable and uproarious latest, Carnage, and is acted out with zest by Winslet, Christoph Waltz, John C. Reilly and Jodie Foster.
Before the vomit.
The film is based on Yasmina Reza's play, God of Carnage. Alan and Nancy Cowan (Waltz and Winslet) visit Michael and Penelope Longstreet (Reilly and Foster) after their sons have been involved in a playground fight. This apparently satisfies their immaculate, right-on parenting needs. But some ropey cobbler and a few unguarded exchanges are all that is needed to unravel the delicate veils of tolerance and decency. The inevitable decline unfolds entirely within the Longstreet apartment over the course of a brisk eighty minutes.
The film's origins on the stage are evident, and Carnage has received some critical stick as a result. The dialogue can be declamatory and the set-up is a little artificial. It is tempting to see Polanski's work as no more than a filmed play, adding little to a live theatre experience. But the film does work well on its own merits. It appeals visually and has a wonderful quartet of actors at its core. Foster and Reilly are amusing as a couple whose cultured, liberal facade is constructed by one and secretly resented by the other. Meanwhile, Winslet and Waltz are even better and even more miserable: she is uneasy and snappish, he is self-involved and wolfish.
With these four in control, deadly humour is the film's greatest strength. After some drily observed early dialogue, the best moments come in the second half, some of them very funny indeed. The actors relish the broader, wilder comedy here. As inebriation takes hold and accusations pile up (involving livelihoods, hamsters and so on), venomous jibes rip preciousness apart. Jodie Foster is hysterically laughing as she proclaims: “My husband has spent the entire afternoon drying things!”. I could not help but wish for things to take an even nastier turn, but the film refuses to become untethered from the real world and soar into total farce. On reflection (and as my co-filmgoer observed), that is a large part of its success.
"I don't have a sense of humour, and I don't want one."
The single-set device is clearly inherited from the stage play. The characters seem trapped, drawn back in whenever they try to leave. It lends a Buñuelian touch; or, as Winslet slurs, “Why are we still in this house?!”. Polanski is masterful enough not to be put off, creating an aesthetically interesting piece out of the static setting. The actors are positioned in various oppressive combinations around the screen. The camera angles are deliberately uncomfortable: a little too high or too low, in tight close-up and deep focus tableaux. Polanski is also not tempted to open up the script beyond the apartment. As Hitchcock saw it (discussing Dial M for Murder), why would you? Easy for him to say perhaps, but Polanski rises to the challenge just as keenly.
On a similar note in fact, according to ever-neckerchiefed director–cineaste Peter Bogdanovich, Hitchcock's view was simply: When the batteries are running dry, take a hit play and shoot it. Polanski is energized here, no doubt, along with his splendid and game cast. Together they have produced a cinematic scherzo, with claws. I think Hitch himself would have enjoyed it.
Within a few years, artist-turned-director Steve McQueen has made a strong impact. Following Hunger, Shame is his second film. It also stars Michael Fassbender, here playing Brandon, a man consumed by sexual addiction. He indulges this to an extreme degree, behind the protection of a highly controlled, successful daily existence. Things unravel following the intrusive entrance of his unstable, needy sister Sissy (Carey Mulligan) and a romantic liaison with a colleague. Shame is not a comfortable watch, and the explicit sexual material borders on the harrowing, but it is a brilliant, modern film.
Brandon is a mesmerizing character. His manner is appealing but distant, his surroundings modern and sparse. He is a lonely man, entombed by a routine of escorts and pornography. Steve McQueen captures this loneliness with carefully composed shots, Fassbender frequently alone on-screen, wandering the city streets or stalking his characterless apartment. Like Taxi Driver before it, Shame studies alienation in New York; Brandon disconnects himself, finding little solace in empty promiscuity.
The fractured relationship between Brandon and Sissy brings to the film a vibrant, sad centre. Initially, we wonder if it is, or has been, incestuous. We are even surprised to learn that they are siblings after their uncomfortably open first scene. There is a great deal of unspoken history and tension, deftly hinted at as the story progresses. Most haunting is one line spoken by Sissy on Brandon's answer machine: "We're not bad people – we just come from a bad place." It asks many questions about their past, the answers to which we can only fathom by grimly witnessing the brother and sister in the present. Does it refer to the shame of the title?
Both Michael Fassbender and Carey Mulligan give genuinely brave, nuanced performances. The result is not draining, but enthralling, notwithstanding the bleak material. Sissy is desperately vulnerable, but Mulligan does not portray a one-note victim. We sympathise with her, despite her wayward dependence. Meanwhile, Fassbender is magnetic as a man who keeps lust and rage barely contained behind an anonymous facade. As Brandon is increasingly provoked, theses urges become dangerously exposed. The effects build steadily, and Fassbender's control is captivating.
Brandon's affair with a colleague, Marianne, expands the character further. They go on a date, a beautifully acted scene which stands out as perhaps the best in the film. It is amusing and charming, but nervous; in a wry touch, the awkward atmosphere is punctured by a waiter's interjections. We feel Brandon is connecting with Marianne, the lust and the rage evaporating. Intimacy, however, is something he ultimately cannot handle. Nicole Beharie is wonderful as Marianne, and with only two key scenes, she is underused.
Shame is marvellously put together. The screenplay (by McQueen and Abi Morgan) is well paced, the photography gleams and Harry Escott's music chills, built on slowly climbing melodic lines. It is a meditative film, made entrancing by the work of the actors, and its strengths are never overwhelmed by the ugly human story it tells. It will stay with me.
It was a week of intense cinema-going, including award season catch-ups and some hidden gems. Here are two of the gems, courtesy of the dizzyingly rich current Filmhouse programme.
We Were Here
This documentary by David Weissman chronicles the impact of HIV/Aids in San Francisco, following its outbreak in the early 1980s. The story of Aids at that time is familiar, but the scale and suddenness of the disaster still shocks; around 15,000 people had died of Aids in San Francisco by the mid-1990s. The phenomenal response of the gay community of the city is the central focus of We Were Here. As love and hedonism plummeted headlong into fear, the reaction was one of compassion and activism.
The film is a well constructed look at this “San Francisco model” throughout the worst years of the epidemic, placing the personal experiences of just five interviewees within a wider picture of political debate and changing attitudes. The speakers describe a painful, inspiring history of care, research, campaigning and loss. In general, they are engaging, able to lift the sober mood. The accounts are absorbingly honest; recollections of weariness, feeling overwhelmed and unable to continue to help, resonate just as much as those of community and pride.
Most eloquent and affecting of all is artist Daniel Goldstein. His story (among the thousands) is tragic – he is the sole survivor of his entire circle of friends and lovers from the start of the epidemic. Emotional but clear-eyed, Goldstein gives us the strongest feel for the time and place. His is a well-rounded insight, taking in his deep connections with the San Francisco gay scene and involvement in early clinical trials. And his personal grief is balanced by his human response and reflection, which he offers without ego or sentiment. I was pleased that he had the final word in this film; the rays of hope at the close are powerful, breaking through the darkest imaginable clouds.
8.5
A Useful Life
Jorge's independent cinema is in severe financial straits. Its projection systems are decrepit and support is dwindling. Jorge must fix things. He must also get Paola, the university lecturer, to join him for a coffee. It is a delicate problem for a quiet man, and makes for a rather fun little film. There is not much depth, but there are enough surprises and wry smiles to sustain the short running time. And it is the first Uruguayan film I have ever seen. Tick.
The look is pleasingly low-key. It is a grainy, off-the-cuff vignette, but it still has moments of elegance. Shots of Jorge ambling up and down in front of prints of Muybridge's galloping horse are beautifully lit, as are those of him strolling through the university quads. Meanwhile, the interiors of the cinema's projection rooms and offices are appealing in their run-down, sagging aspect. This black-and-white film is noticeably grey.
The key attraction is undoubtedly optimistic cineaste Jorge, a likeable schlump with a Hitchcockian jowl. Portly, shambling, and accompanied by rather eccentric music selections on the soundtrack, he sometimes wanders aimlessly and sometimes dances on staircases. He also gets an expensive haircut on a whim. Without actor Jorge Jellinek's splendid countenance and misshapen gait, there would be something sorely missing from the film. But instead we give a little cheer every time he heaves into the frame. Let's hope he gets the girl.
The Artist is taking over the world, award ceremony by award ceremony. Written and directed by Michel Hazanavicius, it is a personal project which has enjoyed remarkable success. Most remarkable of all is that this is a silent film, a bold decision which is paying off miraculously. I was curious, of course.
Jean Dujardin plays George Valentin, a star of the silent screen struggling to adjust to the transition to sound. Having been instrumental in the rise of Peppy Miller (Bérénice Bejo), he sees her career soar from bit-part dancer to sound film phenomenon, whilst his grinds to a halt, with only his dog to console him. Altogether, The Artist is a bright-eyed, sparky look back at Hollywood's biggest upheaval, A Star Is Born by way of Singin' in the Rain and Sunset Boulevard. There are cloche hats, top hats, irascible studio bosses and butlers, all wrapped up with newspaper montages and elegant intertitles to charm even the rookie nostalgist.
It works well and the novelty concept of making a silent film to tell this story is clever, furnished with comic asides, a dash of Duke Ellington and a handsomely costumed cast. It is also a stroke of genius in itself that this is not an art house experiment but a break into the mainstream, attracting press coverage and award season glory. Although maybe that's Harvey Weinstein's genius, coupled with that of the dog (oh hi, Asta).
Unfortunately however, Hazanavicius' style doesn't always fit, taking the swing out of The Artist's thing somewhat. In creating a love letter to the late silent era, he gently apes its spirit, but seems to have wavered along the way. The result is a compromise, not reaching back to the 1920s, but rather settling for a generic 'classic' look. Instead of the urgent inventiveness of the best silent movies, The Artist has more in common with the poised studio-era films of the 40s and 50s, just with the sound removed. Chronology takes a bit of a hit too – had Valentin really not seen nor even heard of sound film until 1929, when hit musicals were already being released?
There are certainly times when things click. The silent films-within-the-film are fun (up there with the best of Lockwood and Lamont), and occasionally the old-school box of tricks is opened. At one point, chattering mouths materialize around the screen to taunt Valentin, and there is a rather brilliant surrealist moment when the soundtrack terrorizes him after his first exposure to synchronized sound.
Meanwhile, bursts of spirited Cotton Club jazz punctuate Ludovic Bource's impressive score. But the score, lush and romantic, again suffers mildly from period wanderlust. When a section of Bernard Herrmann's music for Vertigo appears, it sits comfortably in a way it shouldn't. It is a puzzling moment. The music is gorgeous of course, but why is it used here? It makes one wonder if other references, to the likes of The Battleship Potemkin, are little more than a film school checklist.
All of this is maybe beside the point in the midst of an enjoyable ride. It might all be a glossy surface, with a story not quite original or snappy enough to dispel every gripe, but The Artist is fun to watch. The actors, including Dujardin, John Goodman and James Cromwell, help enormously. Most special of all is Bejo. Peppy is a charming and believable creation – her winning smile caps a delicate tragicomic performance, with which Bejo steals the film. The final scene is a hoot, too. We come out smiling. Perhaps The Artist is not a love letter after all, but a winking postcard.
Adolescence and city living, in the ultimate limited release
Margaret is about Lisa (Anna Paquin), a 17-year-old student from a well heeled part of New York, and the people around her. The story is ignited by an accident, when Lisa distracts a bus driver (Mark Ruffalo) who then misses a red light and kills a woman. The bus driver is not punished and Lisa resolves to bring him to justice, pulling in and arguing with an interesting supporting cast, including her mother (J. Smith-Cameron), her geometry teacher (Matt Damon), and the dead woman's best friend (Jeannie Berlin).
Margaret's tiny release comes after it spent years languishing in post-production hell, the subject of various lawsuits. The film is long, and director Kenneth Lonergan was under pressure to produce a two-hour cut. The released version is a compromise at two and a half hours. Unfortunately this compromise can show, although what remains is still a beautiful study of relationships in a large city.
Everybody's talkin' at me.
At the centre of the film is Anna Paquin's performance, which is tremendous. It is an honest examination of the contradictions of late adolescence – the invisible line trod between confidence and vunerability, assurance and naivety. Lisa does the wrong thing more than once, and she is at times easy to dislike, truculent and opinionated. But the fragile remnants of childhood persist in Paquin's portrayal as a dully attractive glow. I was reminded of Mariel Hemingway in Manhattan more than once.
Although Lisa is trying to assert herself in the adult world of New York City, she is not an adult; it is a fact she has to confront repeatedly. She may be the dominant force in her ethics class or with her awkward admirer Darren (John Gallagher Jr., who I would have enjoyed seeing more of), but more often she finds herself dealing with figures of authority, almost powerless. There are teachers, policemen, lawyers, and eventually the machinations of a corporate-led legal system. She sees her reasoning as obvious, but she is shouted down or brushed aside. Perhaps she is overly dramatic; perhaps she is just too young.
Of course, New York is more than a city – it is a sprawling metropolis. Much of the film's drive comes not just from the relationships between the characters, but how they interact with and respond to the urban environment. From the opening shot onwards, we return to images of crowds jostling in the street and look up at skyscrapers reflected in skyscrapers. Spaces referred to outside of New York seem out of reach: Lisa's father's Californian beach house, her teacher's Indiana upbringing, a planned excursion to New Mexico.
Meanwhile, the city is cluttered and busy; at one point Lisa remarks how many people must be living in one block. Lonergan shows us a place where it is difficult to make oneself heard, and where a stage actress's daughter from the Upper West Side is out of her depth visiting a bus driver's family home.
Sequences focusing on city life give the plot the space it needs, and unfortunately it is perhaps this space which has suffered from the editorial knife forced on the film. As the end of the film is reached, the plot begins to rattle along, as loose ends are tied up and different strands of the story are crammed together. Meanwhile some subplots, such as Lisa's mother's romance with an admirer (Jean Reno), become stranded without the extra running time. It mars the film and halts its flow, which is a shame.
But Margaret still works, an emotional urban film with a thread of natural humour. It is a haunting portrait of a teenage girl's difficult, sometimes desperate climb to emotional maturity.
The opening of The Deep Blue Sea is amazing. Hester (Rachel Weisz) is attempting suicide, gassing herself in a dingy post-war London flat. From here, we jump around her past, seeing her with her staid and solid husband (Simon Russell Beale), seeing her with her lover Freddie (Tom Hiddleston). She meets Freddie, she makes love to him, she attempts suicide. And this whole non-linear narrative display is accompanied by Barber's Violin Concerto. It is loud, sometimes drowning out dialogue. The fragments of the story are bound together by romanticism and regret in the music.
The cinematic magic here belies the stage origins of Terence Davies' latest film. Based on Terence Rattigan's play, the story follows the three main characters in a patchwork of scenes. Hester is trapped in a suffocating marriage to Sir William Collyer, a judge in thrall to convention and to his disapproving mother. In Freddie, she finds excitement, but it is driven by lust and the need for an escape. As Freddie proves to be cruelly unreliable, so Hester finds herself on the brink of emotional collapse and isolation.
That we are watching a play on film is sometimes clear. However, we can rely on the remarkable actors to carry us through. The plot itself is also absorbing, with barbed twists spiking scenes which seem otherwise static on screen (when Sir William confronts Hester outside her flat from his car, for example). But often Davies employs elegant devices to transform the play into cinema which enthrals, while staginess is banished. As characters argue, the camera deliberately intrudes by jumping between them, so we see them face on in turn. It glides over sheltering Londoners in a Tube station, as Hester recalls the war. And there is the opening montage, with music surging across the images.
Music plays an important role in The Deep Blue Sea. This is apparently the case in much of Davies' work, although sadly I have yet to see more. Here the music makes a great impression, but its use is startlingly restrained. Barber looms large (would Walton have been more appropriate?), and a pub singalong of You Belong to Me melts into Jo Stafford's recording at a pivotal romantic moment. But much of the film is silent. Charged as the subject matter is, long pauses dominate and repress the emotion. The characters are struggling in this silence, and so the music has even more impact.
The three lead actors are captivating. Powerful passions ignite the silence and the outbursts. Simon Russell Beale simmers with suppressed rage; Tom Hiddleston can ably slide from caddish to hopeless in a single scene. But Rachel Weisz impresses most. She appears consumed by Hester's fragile and desperate desire to grasp something human through lust. It is a desire that lies at the film's core, and it is not always easy to watch. This is a steady, classical film and it hits deep emotions with small, masterful gestures.
