Last
week my friend Duncan stayed with me here in Clare. For him it was a kind of
retreat, which meant walking, photography, food, Guinness and movies. Duncan is
a film fan too. In fact he runs his own movie Blog, Meaning in Movies, which I strongly recommend for
his thoughtful reviews and gentle moral faith-based critiques.
We
watched a number of movies together, and every morning Duncan would write up
his review of the previous night's show. Duncan reviews every film he sees. That is (part of)
his discipline.
Despite our shared interests in film, food, walking, photography and
Guinness, we are otherwise very different. We come from different places,
geographically, psychologically and theologically. In Myers-Briggs personality type terms we are
opposites. I am
extrovert, intuitive, promoting feelings over analysis; Duncan is not. He
was brought up in a strict Scottish evangelical household. I did not go to church until I
was eleven, and then attended a middle of the road Anglican school chapel. Duncan has been a
missionary. I was a soldier. And yet. We were both eventually drawn to adopt a
liberal attitude to scripture, theology and ethics. I am sure I still say and
do things that cause Duncan to raise his eyes in (mock?) horror. But we get
along fine. Complementarity is a good thing.
So. I thought it would be interesting
to review last week’s movies alongside
Duncan, and let you see if, and how, we differ in our approach and
judgments.
The
films we saw together were;
Silver
Linings Playbook, Code Unknown, True Grit, Au Revoir les Enfants, Blade Runner,
and Winter's Bone.
Do
visit his Meaning In Movies to read his reviews.
I
think that Silver Linings Playbook is a rare thing in a number of ways. It is a feel-good movie about
mental disorder that does not play down the dark side of such illnesses. It takes a young new star,
Jennifer Lawrence, and allows her to do something different, rather that stereotype
her talent. It allows
another actor, Bradley Cooper, who
is already well established in one genre,
to also explore a new range, and it gives Robert de Niro a chance to do
what he is so good at; character acting.
I
have seen Jennifer Lawrence in Winter's Bone, and showed Duncan that hard but
brilliant film because he was so impressed by Lawrence's performance in Silver
Linings,
and I wanted to show him her range. Her last movie, The Hunger Games is competent, but hardly
stretched Lawrence's acting muscles).
The
differences between Bone and Silver are striking. Bone is bleak, filled with tense
fearful or fear inducing characters inhabiting a dismal community set in harsh
grey landscape, living lives of stark rural poverty or crack based
criminality. I showed this
film to my previous congregation as part of my ‘Speaking Truth To Power' season. In it 17 year old Dee. played by
Lawrence, has to confront her family and neighbours to discover the truth they
do not want to reveal; the location of her bail-skipping father. Unless he
turns up in court the house Dee shares with her severely depressed mother and
two younger siblings will be forfeited, along with the timber acres that
provide their only security.
Lawrence's ability to show us Dee's courageous stoicism, determination
and willingness to confront both her own fears and the aggressive opposition of
those 'in the know' in a subtle and understated way is remarkable. John Hawkes plays her uncle
with a coiled tension and latent dangerousness, while Dale Dickey, as Dee’s
cousin/aunt (?) Merab shows that the female of the species can be – if not deadlier
– then as hard hitting as the male.
The script and direction draw us deeper and deeper into this underbelly
of American life. But
the journey is well worth taking.
Silver
Linings is set
in the suburbs. The colours are bright, the characters well-meaning (if
confused) and the main danger is of mutual mis-understanding. Bradley Cooper's character
has issues of anger-management and compulsive behavior. So does his father, played by de
Niro. Lawrence plays a
young widow, struggling with her loss. The traits she seems to share with Dee
are her courage and determination. They share nothing else, Lawrence is utterly captivating,
displaying an agility, both physical and emotional, that Bone did not allow her to express. She deserved her Oscar.
Silver Linings does not pull its punches, but offers and fulfils hope.
Calling it 'feel good' is a compliment. I really left the cinema feeling very
good. I had not seen Cooper before. He made his name in films that do not
appeal to me. But I enjoyed his performance here, convincing and sympathetic,
slowly coming to terms with his delusions and confusions.
True
Grit is the
Coen brother's translation of Charles Portis's novel of the same name. It is not a
remake of the 1969 John Wayne film version. One of the things I liked was the language. Most Westerns put modern American
accents and speech patterns into the mouths of 19th century characters. But so many of the Westerners
came from Scotland, Ireland, Wales and elsewhere in Europe. Many years ago the film Silverado
had John Cleese as a very English Sheriff, and there are un-American accents in True Grit too. But more than
that, there is no vocal elision. No
one says won’t, don’t or can’t.
They say would not, do not, and cannot, staying true to the period.
Just
as Gary Oldman stepped into and filled Alex Guinness's shoes in Tinker,
Tailor, Soldier, Spy,
so in this film Jeff Bridges fills John Wayne's boots as Marshall Rooster
Coburn. The original movie was an
unapologetic vehicle for Wayne, but in the Coen brother's film the honours, and
the true grit quality, are equally shared between Coburn and Mattie, played by Hailee Steinfeld. The 14 year old Mattie is a determined young woman in pursuit of her
father's killer. Seinfeld is
remarkable, and the Coen Brother obviously knew how to draw out an impressive
performance from this young professional. This was her first full length feature film, and
I look forward to her next film, to see what range she can show. She now has thirteen films in post or
pre-production, including Julian Fellowes’ adaptation of Romeo and
Juliet, the SF movie Ender’s Game (with Harrison Ford and another
young star, Abigail Breslin) and
Tommy Lee Jones’ The Homesman. Matt Damon is rewardingly cast against type, in fact
so against type that some viewers did not recognize him until well into the
film. Josh Brolin, Domhnall Gleeson
( Brendan’s lad) and Barry Pepper
add supporting roles. The photography (by Roger Deakin) and music
(Carter Burwell) are used to good effect, as they were in the Coen's No Country for Old Men, but to very different purposes. I admired No Country immensely. I enjoyed True
Grit
enormously.
Then
two French films, Code Unknown and Au Revoir les Enfants. Code
Unknown: Incomplete Tales of Several Journeys was Michael Haneke’s first French film, and
he was encouraged to make it by Juliet Binoche, who later joined him again to make Cache, or Hidden. (It has to be said that neither Duncan nor
I would find it easy to resist any encouragement from Ms Binoche!) Haneke is a
disciplined film maker, well aware that movies can be manipulative in ways that
may compromise the narrative’s integrity and that of the viewer. A Director can direct us, as well
as the movie, using his or her skills to insist that we must see this story this way and no other, using music to tell you what to feel,
camera movement and focus to tell you want to see, and the editing of scenes to tell us what to think, etc. Post Modernists often want
to let the story do it’s own work, and leave us free to make our own
interpretations and connections. The most outstanding example of this style
I have seen in recent years is the Romanian film 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2
Days written
and directed by Cristian Mungliu (2007 Cannes Palme d’Or). It seems that the
more serious the political and ethical implications of a film the more such
directors try not to beat us over the head with the message. Hollywood, this aint. In Code Unknown the scenes start and end
abruptly, with little to help us locate them. The only music is part of the reality. The camera is usually fixed,
or simply tracks to follow the characters, often in long takes, without panning
or tilting to drag our gaze.
In
this film Haneke tells us about lives that briefly touch each other, sometimes
in misunderstood or unrecognised ways.
The only common thread is that they all, in one way or another, have
lost or do not know the Codes.
These codes may be actual, social, personal or ethical, but each gives, or
denies access. A
Romanian economic refugee, a war photographer, an actress, a farmer and his
son, each is lost in different ways, locked out or locked in. The exception is Amadou, a young Malian sign-language
teacher. The children he teaches
bookend the film, communicating something, but do we know what? Do we know their code? Amadou knows these communicative
codes, and moral ones too, but he is in danger of being mis-read by those with
power. His colour speaks against
him.
This
style of film making can seem alienating, but that is part of the purpose,
especially when alienation is also the subject matter. As Duncan points out
in his review this alienation even goes so far as to make the Binoche character
unappealing!
The
next French film was the famous Au revoir, les enfants, Louis Malle’s 1987 autobiographical account of his childhood
in Nazi Occupied France in a Carmelite School. The priests who ran the school harboured a number of Jewish
children, and one adult member of staff. At first the film progresses like any other
school memoir, as the boys bond and fight and learn how to trust or
betray. But when the
Gestapo come looking for Jews the relationships come into sharp focus and the
film changes gear. Shot in
black and white, and avoiding melodrama and sentimentality this film may not
shock as much as The Boy in the Striped Pajamas, but it rings true, and the truth of Nazi persecution and
French collaboration needs to be told. The German cinema has given us Downfall and The Lives of Others, films that portray those who
surrounded and supported Hitler in his last days of the second World War, and
the East German police state’s obsessive surveillance during the Cold War. Pan’s Labyrinth tackled the Spanish Civil
War. The Petainist
capitulation to and collaboration with the Nazi’s persecution of Jews has not,
however, as far as I know, been addressed in French cinema, apart from Au
Revoir. and
Sarah’s Key (2010) co-written by Gilles Paquet-Bremmer and adapted from the
novel by Tatiana de Rosday.
Of course you may know otherwise.
Lastly we watched the Bluray version of the
latest (and last?) version of Blade Runner. Way back in 1982 I wrote a review of this film
for an SF fanzine, and stirred up considerable ire by lavishly praising
it. It has now become the Citizen Kane of sf movies in its influence and regard, but at the time cinema critics were very negative, I think because in it Ridley Scott invented a whole new vocabulary and style and critics are always behind the game. Sf fans also disliked it because it dared to make changes to Saint Philip K. Dick’s
hallowed source novel, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep. I loved the look of it, the
retro/futuristic design, the noctilucious paint brush, the music, acting, and the message. For me the film
still asked a simple question.
What is life? And it gave a
simple answer. Life is
precious. The
Bluray version is wonderfully
clean in image and soundscape, bringing out the true potential of the
original. If you have a DVD copy
give it away and get this.
If you don’t have a copy, get this. It is a milestone in cinema.
Duncan rates his movies numerically. Being a qualitative sort of guy, I do not, but do go to his blog to see how he scored these, and why.
