I don't feel like getting depressed tonight

FACES (1968)

Alcohol, agent of chaos. A spree here and a spree there, and you could find yourself blundering around like George and Martha at a beer festival. To make matters worse, those riddled with suppressed emotions are likely to vent in the most irrational and unabashed manner. With Faces, John Cassavetes utilizes his individual brand of unorthodoxy to provide a social commentary on the upper-middle-class and the hardships faced when marriages hit the skids and that flame of passion finally burns out. So, Cassavetes' incentive? Booze? To a certain extent, but only as a conduit to trigger the film’s principal theme: the human condition.

In the spirit of Virginia Woolf and Days of Wine and Roses, the plot is influenced by alcoholism and regressive behavior, motifs Cassavetes powerfully applies to the film’s social atmosphere, but the big picture here – honest portrayals of the American middle-class – is only framed by these motifs. Quite atypical, but not uncommon in independent features, Faces lacks opening credits. Instead, Cassavetes decides to establish the film with an explanatory opening scene that introduces us to Richard Forst (John Marley), a bigwig financier who’s preparing to screen his latest investment. His colleagues pitch the presentation as “an impressionistic document that shocks” and “honest, but good”; spiel alluding to Cassavetes’ actual feature.

Told through Cassavetes’ cinema-verité-spyglass, Faces makes an effort to dispel the presence of actors and sets, creating the most kinetic environment possible by illustrating its characters as brutal proxies of society. On arrival at escort Jeannie’s (Gena Rowlands) home, Forst and college buddy Fred (Fred Draper) are clearly intoxicated. Jeannie, tipsy herself, guides the two drunkards into her humble abode for some lighthearted foolery; all unaware of the intense pathos soon to erupt. Another harsh episode of truth-bearing occurs when Forst returns home to his subservient wife (Lynn Carlin), who he drunkenly chit-chats with until the elephant in the room – sex – blows its trunk. This is the pattern for a good portion of the film – a bit of fun and games followed by an orgy of grueling misery – however, this “pattern” isn’t exactly standard throughout; the dialogue can be sporadic, whimsical, juvenile, and even deviate from the film’s objective at times, but it continues to ring true realistically.

From my experience with Cassavetes, he’s never been one to adhere to a tripartite structure. His films are "free-verse" in a sense. They come across as heavily improvised because his actors aren’t ball-and-chained down by a script; they’ve been granted the liberty to conduct their characters how they see fit. One to namedrop, Cassavetes references Ingmar Bergman in the film, who also shared a close bond with his actors, but what’s more intriguing is how Cassavetes studies his characters in a fashion similar to Bergman. Both directors have implemented tight, intimate camera techniques (close-ups, etc) in their films in order to “dissect” their characters, and considering that Faces is a critical reflection of our own social conditions, character analysis is imperative.

An ingenious auteur and master of the now prehistoric tools of classic cinema, Cassavetes delivers an aggressive response to the conventions of filmmaking. As a social document, the film virtually KOs our perception of a “level-headed” society, then peels off the layers of facades used to conceal the unpleasant facts we choose to ignore. Refusing to shy away from the film’s distressing themes, Cassavetes reminds us that suppressing anger and contempt is a human condition, and given the right catalyst, we are all vulnerable to emotional collapse.

8.5/10

I hate to see that evening sun go down

THAT EVENING SUN (2009)

Southerner by birth, author William Gay was probably inspired by his own upbringing while penning his collection of short stories, “I Hate to See That Evening Sun Go Down”. We could also assume that he was influenced by William Faulkner’s “That Evening Sun”, a dark depiction of the post-antebellum period, and then go on to posit that Faulkner’s title derives from a lyric in W.H. Handy’s popular blues song “St. Louis Blues”. Needless to say, “That Evening Sun”, in its many variations, has a history firmly entrenched in Southern theme, and in Scott Teems’ screen adaptation, this tone remains undeniably present.

Hal Holbrook, who delivered an Oscar-nominated performance in 2007’s Into the Wild, arguably exhibits the superior performance here as nursing home escapee and former Tennessee landowner Abner Meecham. After bribing, then hitching a ride with a cabbie, Abner is escorted back to his old country farm with the intent of living out his final days away from the nursing home bustle, but to blatant disapproval, Abner is greeted by Lonzo Choat (Ray McKinnon), Abner’s archenemy of sorts, and his family, who the house and land have been leased to. What causes greater frustration is that the property was leased by Abner's own son (Walton Goggins) without his knowledge or consent. Riled up, the ex-Tennessee farmer decides to lodge in an old tenant house on the property in protest against Lonzo, creating a stubborn grudge match between the two, neither intending to leave.

We could sketch a Venn diagram with Abner and Lonzo in mind, and while skimming over the blaring differences, come upon several similarities. They both share an ardor in their resolve and both can be seen as either protagonist or antagonist; Abner seeks to rid his home of the Choats and Lonzo wants to see Abner on the curb. The two incessantly criticize and mentally berate one another throughout the course of the film, and their views toward each other are essential, serving as an embodiment of the story’s major themes.

Abner holds zero reliance in Lonzo’s empty pledges of maintaining the land and harvesting crops, basing his stance on Lonzo’s history of being a lazy, destructive redneck. Lonzo holds his own unreserved doubts in Abner’s ability to maintain the farm and often ridicules Abner, calling him old, weak and incapable. Ironically enough, by the end, both enemies emerge from the hell they put themselves through with a less cynical take on life. In the scheme of things, Evening Sun is a tale of life evaluation and embracing change.

On the technical end of Evening Sun, the cinematography brilliantly complements the rural scenery, and from someone raised partially in the south, I was impressed with how Teems transformed an otherwise shabby, homely backdrop into something quite alluring; many of the scenes that reel along without dialogue look fresh out of a Julian Onderdonk painting. Shot on location in Knoxville, Teems shields this prosaic environment from the outside world and transfixes his audience with keen mastery. The story itself, told at a reasonable pace, suffers a smidgen from its occasionally stilted script, although this is only a minor hindrance. The actors, however, are perfectly cast and while Holbrook showcases a better effort here than in Sean Penn’s feature, Ray McKinnon steals the show. Simply told, and with remarkable imagery, That Evening Sun is a burgeoning breeze that swells, fades, then reappears for a warm farewell.

8.5/10

I love Count Chocula; I love the character, I love the flavor

SORRY, THANKS (2009)

Bouncing off the arid Exploding Girl comes another indie-romance, a comedy, with a bit more pizzazz. Sorry, Thanks is a rarity that abandons the formulaic route most romances tend to follow, with their emotional breakdowns and contrived happy endings. In her very postmodern debut, director Dia Sokol has somehow tapped into Larry David’s ingenuity and created a mumblecore romance about…nothing. Well, not entirely about nothing; we have a plot rooted in one-night stands, casual relationships, etc., but the story essentially deviates from psychoanalyzing why society engages in such activity and instead examines the lives of a colorful group of San Franciscans and their everyday routine. A tad trivial for some filmgoers, but I find it endearing when directors stray from the norm and illustrate the typical, often tedious day-to-day.

In Sorry, Thanks, Dazed and Confused alum Wiley Wiggins portrays Max, a goofy, jocose character earning his keep as a senator’s office assistant, and Kenya Miles is Kira, a recently single, overqualified corporate worker in the process of downsizing to the second-string profession of copy-editing. Max, currently in a relationship, trysts with Kira, finds himself in her company during unexpected intervals, and recklessly tries to ripen the fling Kira wishes to forget. More character study than love story, Sorry, Thanks offers a brief snapshot that captures the burdens of post-collegiate life and looming adulthood. With consistent humor and charming performances, Sokol’s series of mundane vignettes is an enjoyable time-waster.

8/10

We call them hopeful monsters

THE EXPLODING GIRL (2009)

Somewhere in the hipster-ridden vicinities of New York City, two youths are casually trying to maintain a dignified amity to no avail. The wise Harry Burns philosophized in When Harry Met Sally that “men and women can't be friends because the sex part always gets in the way," and while the “sex part” isn’t as magnified in Bradley Rust Gray’s The Exploding Girl as it may have been in that particular 1989 romantic-comedy, it’s an underlying fact that our two young focal points are avoiding the sexual escapades that will inevitably transform their prickly friendship into something far more awkward.

Yep, I believe “awkward” is the most suitable word to define this film, a film yearning to distinguish itself as character-driven to a fault, yet lacks the emotional drive to be seen as anything other than a near-vacant allegory on platonic love. The inspired tale introduces us to Ivy, a lovesick, twenty-something college student home on holiday, and her close friend Al, a shy young fellow of few words. The two eventually come to a head over the classification of their relationship, but remain remotely unexplored as characters in the process. Not without that principal edge every indie-romance seems to entail, Exploding Girl’s driving force comes in the form of Ivy’s epilepsy; as the film progresses, her “jerks” amplify, and progress it does with bouts of uncertainty, spells of alienation, and the all-too-predictable case of infidelity, aspects which may seem a bit too vague in this review, but the film opts to frame them as such.

What I did admire is how Ivy is the film’s unique, unconventional sufferer, suffering not only on the surface of cliche romantic woes, but underneath, enduring loneliness and even light disaffection from her own mother. The film just barely touches on these poignant angles, and if Gray had only scrutinized the full spectrum of Ivy’s plight, I would have appreciated his attempt a great deal more. Alas, what we have here is a faint, but linear plot that represents what we already knew about platonic relationships.

7.5/10

We don't need other worlds. We need a mirror.

SOLARIS (1972)

WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD

My first experience with Solaris was bogged down a bit by a minor issue regarding Tarkovsky’s decision to open the story on Earth – detailing psychologist Kris Kelvin’s (Donatas Banionis) nostalgic saunter around his childhood home before embarking on a journey into space – instead of following the novel, which jumps directly into the meat of the plot and focuses entirely on the titular planet. It wasn’t until I revisited Tarkovsky’s sci-fi epic that I came to fully appreciate Kelvin’s lengthy farewell and was able to better evaluate the environmental effects of both Earth and Solaris, and their impact on Kelvin’s psyche.

With that said, heed this: Solaris requires revisiting. Unquestionably. However, it’s amusing to note that, while I sit here advising my readers (now that’s amusing) to watch this film twice for better elucidation, the film itself actually berates man’s quest for understanding. Contradictory, yes, but as a drunken Dr. Snaut declares in the film, “we shouldn’t write off what we don’t understand.”

The actual meat I referred to earlier, which the novel knives right into, finds Kelvin on board an unkempt space station orbiting the eerie, oceanic planet of Solaris. It can be said that this is where the action, or lack thereof, really kicks off, however – after my revisit – I found that Tarkovsky’s prologue really lays the groundwork for the plot, adding proper insight into what exactly occurs on this mysterious planet and the effects it has on those who seek to understand it. After a leisure stroll in his backyard, Kelvin is met with words of caution from Henri Burton (Vladislav Dvorzhetsky), a former space pilot who witnessed peculiar sightings on the surface of Solaris. His testimony – including video of his findings; cloudy, fogged images – raised several eyebrows and was dismissed on grounds of absurdity, mere hallucinatory effects. Kelvin also dismisses the astronaut’s claims, follows through with his mission on Solaris – which is essentially to prod the planet with radiation beams and see if it flinches – and inevitably discovers “hallucinations” of his own, later confirmed to be quite real by the amicable Dr. Snaut (Jüri Järvet) and the standoffish Dr. Sartorius (Anatoli Solonitsyn). The doctors refer to these figures as “guests”, and Kelvin’s "guest" happens to be his dead wife, Hari (Natalya Bondarchuk).

Solaris is embedded underneath a mound of themes, but only two really jut their heads out: fear and knowledge, and the motif of fear adds disturbing weight. Once we find ourselves hovering in Solaris’ atmosphere, we pick up on an unearthly silence that heavily denotes the bizarre events ahead. Tarkovsky cleverly enforces a sort of vacant cinematography – cold long-takes, little dialogue – allowing the audience to absorb the same hollowness Kelvin experiences on board. Eduard Artemyev’s score, sparsely, but effectively employed, also serves as a fulcrum for Tarkovsky’s fear motif. Adding to my fanaticism, and maybe even sadistic amusement, is how fear virtually depletes the astute psychologist’s morale gauge; here’s a shrink questioning his own sanity, buckling under layers upon layers of trepidation. It’s a fascinating reminder that, regardless of our sharp intellect and advanced technology, we remain a vulnerable race. He later comes to treat “guest” Hari as humanely as possible after learning that his own thoughts and memories are what created her, via the enigmatic oceans of Solaris, which is never thoroughly explained, and perhaps doesn’t need to be.

Fear seamlessly ties into knowledge, naturally and inescapably. Dr. Snaut reveals himself as a firm advocate of anti-exploration toward the end of the film, stating that, as humans, “we are in a ridiculous predicament of man pursuing a goal that he fears and that he really does not need.” The juxtaposition of Snaut’s practical mindset against Sartorius’ zealous, analytical mindset is vital. At one point, Snaut sardonically refers to Sartorius as “Faust, seeking a remedy against immortality.” A reverse Faust, Sartorius is determined to approach ultimate truth, attaining some form of zenith, while Snaut only seeks introspection, and holds the opinion that a race incapable of understanding themselves has no business analyzing alien life-forms. Solaris symbolizes a dead end of sorts, a barrier Sartorius’ divine intelligence is unable to penetrate. Attempts at understanding the planet’s phenomena prove futile, and that frightens Sartorius to the core. Snaut reminds us, “the happiest people are those who aren’t interested in cursed questions.”

Solaris’ set design is beyond words; the undulating stillness of those eerie long-takes in the station’s interiors and the debris-cluttered corridors immediately set the film’s tone. Picking back up on the comparison of Earth and Solaris, Tarkovsky juxtaposes the two by displaying Kelvin’s childhood home as dreamy, vibrant with life, opposed to the cold, austere space station in order to imply the emotional transition Kelvin makes. Scrap-ridden and desolate as the station may appear, a couple of rooms have been furnished with refined taste. Several works by the Old Masters not only reside in the station, but also subtly give away the film’s ending. We can only infer that Pieter Bruegel’s Landscape with the Fall of Icarus foreshadows Kelvin’s descent to one of Solaris' newly formed islands, while Kelvin and his father practically mirror Rembrandt’s Return of the Prodigal Son during their bittersweet reunion. Touché, Tarkovsky.

Solaris, slow-paced and rightfully so, is one for the ages, a film every cinephile should add to their queue. Calling it thought-provoking would be an injustice. Haunting, visceral, it’s one of those rare diamonds in the rough of Hollywood kitsch I’d love to see more of.

9/10

It's better not knowing anything

LAST TANGO IN PARIS (1972)

How far can man delve into his own mental diversions? Escapism is considered to be a common cure for the toils and banalities of daily life, but can escapism also be seen as a “drug” for curing the condition of being human? Karl Marx famously referred to religion as the “opium of the people,” and like religion, escapism is the product of an inverted world. This inverted world relies on illusory happiness to suppress feelings of angst and despair, thus encouraging a suspension of reality.

In Last Tango in Paris, Marlon Brando, who brilliantly portrays widower Paul, finds his “opium” in excessive sexual activity with bride-to-be Jeanne (Maria Schneider) after his wife commits suicide. One of the prerequisites for their sexual trysts is that neither of them can divulge any personal information – names included – during the course of their affair. Paul establishes this rule with the intention of fully veiling himself; not only from Jeanne, but from the life he has come to abhor. This arrangement goes swimmingly for a period, but Jeanne soon finds herself consumed by Paul's abstract reality and demands a bit of forthrightness from their affair, an affair that has inadvertently evolved into a profound relationship. Jeanne, of course, bites off more than she can chew and comes to learn that sometimes anonymity has its perks.

Bernardo Bertolucci coats Last Tango with the peculiar shades of gloom and obscurity that most aren’t accustomed to seeing in Paris-driven romances, achieving the conception of a dismal love story against an unlikely backdrop. Brando effortlessly adapts to this world; dropping playful lines in French like a native and delivering the performance of a lifetime. Schneider, whose subplot grew a bit drab in areas, adequately holds her own opposite the screen legend. By and large, the film’s explicit nature is indisputable, but does not serve as a centerpiece by any means. Ironically enough, with Last Tango, Bertolucci has crafted the most realistic account of a man’s escape from reality, butter included.

9/10

Whenever I hear the word "culture," I bring out my checkbook

CONTEMPT (1963)

The stereotypical American prototype, the man-in-the-middle screenwriter, the disheartened wife, and Fritz Lang. Jean-Luc Godard frames these wildly dramatic characters against breathtaking Italian scenery and simultaneously exploits their blossoming scorn in taxing, prolonged fashion. Typical of Godard’s method, the film boasts several recurring motifs, incorporates the director’s choice themes of capitalism and consumerism, and of course, flaunts his indulgences of hyper-stylization and quirky camera tricks. The story, a film within a film, is unequally divided between two plights: the plight of the artist and the commercialist, and the plight of man and woman.

Oddly enough, the more intriguing, yet less explored form of contempt is anchored by artistic director Fritz Lang – in an endearing performance as himself – and shallow, capitalist producer Jeremy Prokosch (Jack Palance), who sets out to undermine Lang’s conceptual direction of The Odyssey – which blatantly parallels the characters' dilemmas – by calling in playwright Paul Javal (Michel Piccoli) to revamp the entire script for a more mainstream audience. The far less interesting plight of man and woman employs Javal and his wife, a hyper-sexualized Brigitte Bardot, as the deteriorating married couple who tediously debate over the solidity of their fidelity while also trying to cope with the realization of inevitable separation. Godard makes use of his famous tracking shots to propel the realism of these two jaded characters' relationship, all the while holding my investment in the film by a thread.

A man for acquired tastes, Godard paints a captivating, revelatory experience for film-goers, only to be hindered by incessant pondering of love and strife, loyalty and infidelity; great motifs ran into the dirt. However, the score – which swells beautifully in the most unusual places, then abruptly cuts off; common in Godard films – decorates Contempt nicely and the alluring cinematography transcends the story's often humdrum content to a point of immense appreciation. So, fortunately for Godard-lovers, despite my cold and perhaps off-putting assessment, Contempt is not to be missed. The film’s redeeming factors far outweigh its flaws, and Godard’s admirable approach to filmmaking is clearly evident here.

7.5/10