Thursday, June 30, 2005
Cote d'Azur (2005)
*Warning the following analysis contains a discussion of the entire film – including the ending.
Cote d’Azur is what I think of as a very French romantic-comedy. Very French meaning a romantic-comedy where characters are very frank and uninhibited discussing sex, where the characters are free having sex, and where everyone is cheating.
Cote d'Azur tells the story of a family vacationing on the Cote d’Azure coast tracing their wacky and mixed-up sexual exploits – mom, dad, brother, sister and all.
Sister’s story is most easy – she is 18 (or so) and immediately leaves the family vacation to go off to Portugal with her leather-clad biker boyfriend. The rest is far more complicated. Mom, Béatrix, is, having an affair (and has been for a couple of years). Her sex-obsessed lover follows Béatrix on vacation determined to break up her marriage so they can be together. Béatrix and Dad, Marc, are convinced their son, Charly, is gay and is experimenting sexually with his visiting friend, Martin. The truth is the Martin is gay but Charly is not.
Most complicated, and the story the film really pivots upon, is the Marc’s. We learn Marc's secret when Charly chases Martin afte a fight to apologize. Charly knows Martin is going to the gay meeting spot for those interetsed in casual sex. When Charly arrives he is stunned to see his dad kissing the plumber who had propositioned Charly and Martin the previous night.
Dad's secret now out these French folks can talk even more plainly about sex and sexuality. Mom and dad’s lack of intimacy (and her need for a lover) is suddenly clear. Dad’s worry and emotional outbursts around his Charly’s supposed homosexuality (and Martin's true homosexuality) are more understandable as they stem from his own inner frustrations. And the final resolution, telegraphed but still humorous, is an old, TV show style joke: each pair of lovers open their beach house bedroom windows the following summer to greet the day as one big, happy vactioning bunch. The couples of course include mom with the lover and dad with the plumber. All so very happy, so very fulfilled, so very French.
Plus there are a few humorous musical numbers thrown in for no good reason – you have to love that.
Even though the film explores budding and repressed homosexuality there is really no new ground covered in this film, no significant social message. And perhaps being able to have a film with homosexuality as its central theme and not feel the need to explore any social commentary is significant in itself. Implicit in the story however is how homosexuals of different ages are able to deal with their identity – teenaged Martin is able to be open and secure in his identity from the very beginning of his sexual life, while the father felt the need to repress his identity, reject his true love, and create a sham marriage with children feeling obliged to try a ‘normal’ life. It has taken him decades to resolve his true identity. (Hmm, perhaps there is a significant social message after all.)
Should you see it? Yes, if for no other reason than to leave the film saying – "that was so French!"
Wednesday, June 29, 2005
5X2 (2004)
*Warning the following analysis contains a discussion of the entire film – including the ending.
Awful, absolutely awful. So awful I can barely bring myself to write an intelligible analysis.
5X2 is an exercise in how much you cannot wait for a film to end. It is an exercise in how much we can hate a mundane character. It is an excise in how pissed-off you can be for how long of a time in a movie theater. Its story is about showing us how awful and abusive its main character, Gilles, can be to our other main character Marion, his enfeebled, gutless wife. The awful abuse in 5X2 is not instructive, edifying or even extraordinary – it is mundane, functional cruelty. Ozon, perhaps, is providing a look behind those real life relationships that are mildly abusive in public; showing us how terribly abusive they may be behind closed doors. If so Ozon offers no redemption, no justice, no insight of any kind into such masochism. And I am still pissed-off thinking about watching this film.
There is so much that disappoints in 5X2. Perhaps atop of the heaps and heaps of disappointments, frustrations and anger is the simple disappointment that this is an Ozon film. What I have loved most about Ozon’s films is his abundant love for women, women of all ages, (especially beautiful women of all ages), and the wonderful roles he has created for them in Under the Sand, 8 Women and Swimming Pool. He is woman’s director and I have loved him for that. And to have him throw this horrid film at us where his main female character is such a wimp, so willing to take abuse without a fight, is absolutely maddening. (I can feel the pissed- off-ness rising in me again as I write about it now.)
The opening sequences sets off the infuriation (and offers more than enough vileness to walk out of the theater). The first scene shows Gilles and Marion sitting before a lawyer who is reading the lengthy terms of their divorce. Cut to a hotel room. They have decided to have one last sexual encounter before going into their new divorced lives. Once there, however, Marion decides she does not want sex after all, and in an infuriating scene Gilles rapes her – rapes with hardly a fight from Marion. I still cannot shake the grotesque image of Gilles grip around Marion and her half-hearted, ineffectual struggle to stop him. Ozon does not play this scene as a violent, crazed struggle where Gilles eventually overpowers Marion after a significant fight. What is infuriating is Marion barely exerts herself, a few half-hearted, feeble pushes and a flaccid ‘no’ is all she can muster. Worst still,( yes it gets worse), after the rape Marion goes into the bathroom, changes and comes out to talk with Gilles about when he will be picking up their son. What the fuck!! You wanted her to pull out a gun a blow his head off and instead she is chatting about visitation. I have never recovered from this repulsive wrongheaded scene, and I am still infuriated.
The film than goes back in time so we can see all the other ways Gilles was abusive to Marion, and all the other ways in which she takes it without a struggle.
There is no good reason for this film to exist unless you want a cold-eyed, un-redemptive view into a masochistic, abusive relationship.
And I am still infuriated.
Should you see it? You should gather every copy of the film and burn them and make believe Ozon never mad this horrible, horrible mistake.
Tuesday, June 28, 2005
Sabah (2005)
*Warning the following analysis contains a discussion of the entire film – including the ending.
An age-old story told with a new cultural twist and in a very entertaining way, but with a too-sugary Hollywood ending. As recently discussed in Peach Girl, this must be one of the 7 plots that exits in that limited plot theory– the story of 2 lovers fighting to be together across cultural barriers. The only thing that makes this film at all new are the cultures – a Muslim woman and a divorced white Canadian guy – which really does not make it new at all. It is no different really from the Irish/Puerto Rican barrier in West Side Story, the Montague and Capulet divide of Romeo and Juliet or, for that matter, the Uptown Girl and Downtown Boy divide of the Billy Joel song. (Please insert any of the 1000s of other examples here.)
Despite the extremely well trodden path the director does manage a few surprises. Well not quite surprises, since this is a Hollywood version of this story (even though it is Canadian) you know from the moment Sabah and Stephen meet they will be together in the end. The surprises are in the details of Muslim culture that you probably do not know unless you are Muslim or have close friends who are. For example, the stark divide between a woman’s ultra-conservative appearance, which they must wear in public, and the ultra sexy persona they take on in the home. There are glimpses of the Muslim gender and family hierarchy. There is a little exposition on how (or if) a Muslim lifestyle can adapt (but not disappear) within a liberal western culture, and a yummy look at some good middle-eastern food. And speaking of yummy looks: best of all is the peak we get of belly dancing which is incredible and sexy through-out the film. (How authentic any of these insights are I cannot say.)
On a personal level the film begins to explore (but does not go deep enough into) the personal awakening of Sabah as an independent and sexual woman. She has lived for 40 years as a ‘good Muslim woman’, playing roles of child, sister and mother to various family members, roles others have defined for her. The best moments of Sabah show Sabah slowly emerging as an independent and ultimately courageous woman as she moves from secretive adolescent games in her relationship with Stephen to her final courageous stand where she is ready to leave behind her family (in particular the shackles of her brother’s judgments) to pursue her independent self.
There are two significant events in the last 15 minutes – one a very good twist and one a horrible Hollywood climax. The skilled scene involves the humanizing of Sabah’s brother. Throughout the film he is a macho, chauvinistic tyrant who will not let the women in his family have any freedoms. He has become the figurehead of the family since his dad’s death and he acts like a tyrannical king and treats all the woman like children, controlling everything from their bank accounts to their personal lives. We see him as an asshole. However in the films climax we realize that when their father died there was not nearly enough money to support the family. He assumed the role of protector and provider and has been working himself to death (without telling anyone) believing as oldest male the financial burden of his sisters and mother has fell upon him. It is implied that he has become a traditionalist (and an asshole) because of the immense stress he has been under secretly supporting them all. And though it does not excuse his actions at least he is understood to be more than an ogre.
The sickening scene comes in the dénouement. Sabah exposes her secret relationship to the white Canadian, and is briefly expelled from the family by the mean brother. In the riveting scene where we learn about the brother’s sacrifice for the family’s finances, long held secrets are laid on the table and the film's final resolution is insight. Then we cut to a year later. We are suddenly in the last minutes of a bad sitcom rather than a feature film. Everything has been neatly and happily tied up, the whole family (including the now married Sabah and Stephen) is all lovey-dovey and the white guy is trying in a bungling white guy way to be a good Muslim, or something. It is all perfectly wrapped-up - smiles and happy endings all around. To put it plainly: there is enough saccharine in this final scene to kill a lab rat.
(Though it doesn’t quite kill the movie – it simply makes it a cream-puff Hollywood romantic-comedy when it could have been something more daring.)
Should you see it? If you can stand the ultimate shallowness of a sitcom happy-ending with a few pregnant cultural issues laying unexplored on the surface, this is the film for you.
Monday, June 27, 2005
Inlaws and Outlaws (2005)
Director: Drew Emery
*Warning the following analysis contains a discussion of the entire film – including the ending.
This Seattle based film may be the most emotionally stirring documentary I have ever witnessed. I must admit to tears 2 or 3 different times over the almost 2 hours. Perhaps the most surprising element of this powerful documentary is its simple (almost mundane) subject matter: a group of regular people talking about the people they love.
The hook to most documentaries is some extraordinary event (historical or personal), or a look into a world that is exotic, foreign, surprising or unknown in some way – something we have never seen before. By contrast the subject matter of Inlaws and Outlaws, ordinary falling in love, is extremely well known to us all and the stories are told with few starling events, nothing shocking, nothing in fact that you probably have not heard (or actually experienced) before. Yet the stories carry an impact that is emotionally overpowering.
Inlaws and Outlaws documents the relationships of a number of couples, mostly gay and lesbian, and has each simply tell their story of love. What is extraordinary is the courage some of the couples displayed by laying their most intimate emotions before the camera. You leave feeling you have witnessed what is most beautiful in humanity.
Further, the film is frequently hilarious and always entertaining. The director, Drew Emery, has inserted poignant musical pieces (performed by a jazz singer and band in a night club setting) to set up each new segment while allowing us to think about what has come before. Further, the musical devise divides the talk into the different parts of the relationships. And the final scene where the singer performs “Our Love Is Here To Stay” and we slowly realize the crowd dancing is made up of the couples from the film provides an unexpected and perfect closing to their stories and this powerful film.
Some of the couple we meet:
A lesbian couple who were brought up Mormon and fought internal conflicts stemming from religious and family pressures for years before finally coming together. They had been lovers since high school but one of the two decided to marry and fake a 'traditional' life. She could not, and found the courage to put aside her guilt and family disowning to be with her true love.
There is an older man whose lover recently died after 50 years together. They found it necessary to remain closeted their entire lives with many friends thinking they were brothers. Also having grown up in an abusive household he tells how his father would have literally killed him if his homosexuality was discovered. The depth and beauty of their relationship is clear as he talks of their life together, and it is impossible not to cry when he speaks of David’s death.
There are a couple of older lesbian couples who tell simple yet beautiful stories of love. And it is these older couples that are most powerful and which brought me to tears. Why? Perhaps because you feel their love is most pure somehow. They have left behind social pressures such as marriage or children, have moved beyond superficialities of beauty or status, and have come together simply and purely for love. (That all may be complete bullshit which I am projecting onto these couples, but the feeling that their love is coming from a place most genuine remains with me.) And any film that can project that kind of beauty and make you feel that pure goodness of love is more than entertainment, it is life inspiring and emotionally cathartic.
There is a sad and still raw story of a divorce initiated by a husband who accepted he was gay in his 40s after years of marriage and children.
And then there is the young lesbian couple that is held up as the hero couple of the film – the hero relationship (in social terms). No, not because their love is any more strong or they had to overcome anything more difficult; rather because their relationship is the most easy and accepted, the most 'ordinary' of the gay relationships. They met, fell in love and got married in a traditional ceremony surround by friends and family and live together happily as wife and wife. Their relationship is the point of the film – this is how it should be but how it is not. It is a human rights message of the radical ordinary – I dare you to see these loving couples and maintain their love deserves any less recognition than straight love; I dare you to find the difference between the heterosexual and homosexual relationships.
Should you see it? Absolutely, you will find what is most beautiful in humanity.
Friday, June 24, 2005
Peach Girl (1931)
*Warning the following analysis contains a discussion of the entire film – including the ending.
What struck me most about this 74 year-old silent Chinese film was how well the story has held up across decades and cultures. Often silent films are enjoyable because they have become antiquated and we can delight in how much the world and movie making has changed. Peach Girl, by contrast, is enjoyable because it is good story told well and it was written, acted and directed with cinematic skill that remains obvious in 2005.
Of course there are charming period elements in Peach Girl. The obsolete conveyance in which two servants carry the landlord and her son from the city to their farm, the hand spun loom Miss Lim uses to gather wool. Also there are antiquated cultural norms on display, in particular the humorously oblique language explaining Miss Lim’s out of wedlock pregnancy. But these items do nothing to lessen the impact of the story; rather they fascinate the way they would in a period piece made today.
Perhaps the film has held up so well because the story told is far older the 74 years that has past since the film was made and has been told countless times across decades and cultures since much before 1931.
I know somewhere there is a theory that there are only 7 plot lines (or some number) which are told again and again. I’ve never actually read that theory and do not know the plot lines but I’m confident this is one of them. Two people fall in love across some cultural barrier and must struggle to be together despite the boundaries imposed by societal norms. In this case the boundaries are those separating wealthy urban dwellers and poor rural peasant farmers in early 20th century China. Miss Lim, the beautiful peasant girl, and the wealthy upper class son have known each other since childhood and fall in love. His mother will have none of it and forbids the marriage. Son tucks Miss Lim away in a mistress pad unbeknownst to either set of parents and eventually she becomes pregnant. When Miss Lim, her dad and Son demand marriage given Miss Lim’s predicament Mom continues to forbid the marriage. Since this is the tragic version of this story line Miss Lim and Dad are banished from farming Mom’s land, Dad goes blind and they enter crushing poverty that eventually leads to sickness and death for Miss Lim.
There is slight redemption in the end. Son hears Miss Lim is dieing and escapes the imprisonment of his mother. He gets to Miss Lim just as she breathes her last breathe. Son takes his daughter and now blind grandfather and demands he raises the daughter as his own and Mom accept Granddad as a true member of their family. Mom agrees and there is a bit of uplift tempering the tragic love story.
Should you see it? Yes indeed. A great example of the timelessness of skillful filmmaking.
Tuesday, June 14, 2005
2046 (2004)
*Warning the following analysis contains a discussion of the entire film – including the ending.
The starling beauty and visual artistry must be noted first when discussing a Wong Kar Wai film. I would go as far as to say he is the most visually beautiful filmmaker working today. Kar Wai constructs his films to allow his audience to indulge in his visual gift. First, he slows his films way down when compared with typical cinematic pacing – and when compared to the frenetic editing of many contemporary films his seem to be running with the projector set at too slow a speed. Kar Wai employs many extended still camera shots on unmoving figures and landscapes so his audience can appreciate and comprehend his visual compositions – compositions that could withstand (if extracted from the frame and placed in a gallery) the scrutiny given a still photograph or oil painting (which many of these images resemble). Kar Wai also has numerous slow-motion shots (of a beautiful woman walking, of curling cigarette smoke, of a tear falling or pipe dripping) so we can further languish in his artistry and appreciate these gorgeously composed moving images. Kar Wai’s films are a breathe-taking antidote to the MTV inspired rapid-fire edit – by comparison watching a Kar Wai film is more like a walk through an art gallery but a gallery in which the accumulation of gorgeous images tell a complex narrative.
2046 is just as beautifully imagined as Kar Wai earlier masterpiece, In the Mood for Love. However, 2046 does not work emotionally. We in the audience remain oddly cold and distant from the characters and their relationships throughout the film. Somehow, we cannot find anyone to sympathize with or any one’s love to root for.
This emotional coldness, however, is an integral part of the story. 2046 depicts a romantic philosophy – each one of us can truly fall in love only once, and once that lover is no longer ours we can never truly be in love again. As one character puts it “if we fall in love with that person too soon or too late” we become like Mr. Chow, moving restlessly from one relationship to another perhaps never realizing why our relationships are ultimately unfulfilling. In 2046 Mr. Chow embodies this theory as we see his inability to have a truly fulfilling relationship because he had already found and lost his one love (as seen in In the Mood For Love).
The film follows a number of relationships and these stories are complexly interwoven. Further complicating the plot are scenes from Mr. Chow’s science-fiction story he is writing, entitled 2046, and which is based on his relationships. This devise of the story in a story is a vehicle for Kar Wai's exposition on the film’s romantic philosophy and Mr. Chow’s reflection on his life and relationships.
There are two main flaws in 2046. The structure is too complex making the interweaving stories really difficult to follow. (Or perhaps I missed too many subtitles being unable to take my eyes off Kar Wai's visual beauty.) Also, this movie about relationships is oddly cold and unemotional. It is possible the film is intentionally unemotional to reflect Mr. Chow’s own inner detachment. And though this may sound like a good idea in theory, in the practice of watching the film it is a flaw, one which ultimately dooms the film as a whole.
Should you see it? Opt for In the Mood for Love – it is just as gorgeously shot and filled with all the emotion missing in 2046.
