You are American; you think you can escape history

THE AMERICAN (2010)

There's a scene near the beginning of The American where George Clooney’s enigmatic Jack encounters a woman named Mathilde (Thekla Reuten) to discuss business pertaining to an assassination. Mathilde wants Jack to craft a custom-made rifle to be used in this assassination and Jack obliges her after requesting the rifle’s specifications in a suave, but monotone manner. The way this concise shop talk of theirs plays out is pivotal in that it sets the tone for the remainder of the film. It’s cold and mechanical much like the weaponry these characters handle for a living and offers no insight into their personalities. The audience is thus left with what’s on the surface; a shared interest (business) and little else.

As an obscure slow burn, American manages to work on somewhat of an atmospheric level thanks in part to Anton Corbijn’s (Control) gorgeous direction and keen eye for detail, but attempting to invest some form of emotional interest in Jack’s mission is where you begin to realize Corbijn's and 28 Days Later scribe Rowan Joffe's thriller slowly derail. The story (an adaptation of Martin Booth’s novel "A Very Private Gentleman") follows a particularly narrow line structurally. Jack, a hired gun who flees off to a remote Italian village following a botched assignment in Sweden is contracted with a final job through his handler Pavel (Johan Leysen) which involves designing the custom-made rifle mentioned earlier. During his stay, Jack is hounded by a Swedish assassin, considers seeking redemption with the aid of a local priest and falls head over heels for an archetypal hooker with a heart of gold. Each of these plot points, while not necessarily groundbreaking for the genre, might have worked to some degree on paper, but they lack weight on screen. None of what pans out during the course of this film is especially engaging, and therein lies the rub.

The Swede hired to kill Jack pops up intermittently and is only utilized as a tool to contrive tension here and there. The priest (Paolo Bonacelli) is introduced as a figure that might potentially play an important part in pushing the redemption angle, but his entire arc is ultimately squandered. And Jack’s relationship with dubious prostitute Clara (Violante Placido) suffers from an inadequate amount of character development, yet the film bookends on the notion that theirs was a passionate, yet tragic affair the likes of something Shakespearean.

It goes without saying that the film’s biggest hang-up is that each interaction referenced above is stale in execution, and a small share of the blame rests on Clooney’s uninspired screen presence. American is sort of akin to Michael Clayton in the sense that it’s a film that doesn't call for the actor’s trademark charm, but Clooney verges on being borderline comatose (as a contract killer, of all professions) it’s almost unnatural to think of him as anything other than a common tourist – despite some gratuitously placed tattoos. The script, of course, isn't without fault; ripe for a magnetic character study treatment, it fails to live up to its intrigue and makes little effort at cracking beneath the surface of Jack’s psyche.

At its best, American is reminiscent of Jean-Pierre Melville’s quiet thriller Le Samourai, a classic that also subverts the conventions films of its genre tend to abide by so often. Difference is, Samourai paces itself at a rate that holds the viewer’s attention with sequences that never stall the production, whereas American prolongs its more mundane elements (the assembling of a gun and its parts for instance) without much of a payoff substance-wise come the climax. Both low key shoot ‘em ups pride themselves on being succinct, but while one is firing on all cylinders, the other is firing on none.

6/10

Vows are spoken to be broken

MAP OF THE SOUNDS OF TOKYO (2009)

I could probably think of several worthier films to ring in the New Year with, but I’ve shelved this one long enough, so here we go. It seems that most films set in Japan – helmed by non-Japanese directors – share a common, irksome trait: the directors’ overzealous approach in exploring the cityscape, various customs and foreign lifestyles which, of course, is aesthetically pleasing, but ultimately transforms their work into a lengthy travelogue that turns out to be more taxing than enjoyable to sit through. Sofia Coppola’s Lost in Translation – which I really admired for its ethereal quality – suffered from “travelogue” syndrome in a few areas; focusing more on setting while leaving scant room for story, but at least Coppola was considerate enough to imbue some life into her script in terms of characterization.

With Map of the Sounds of Tokyo, Coppola’s fellow Japanophile Isabel Coixet (Elegy, Paris, je t'aime) not only managed to strike me as a travel agent under the guise of a filmmaker, but also as someone who seems overenthusiastic about bathing their film in ornate visuals to cover up a weak story. However, despite being a prime example of style over substance, what Map does well, it does extremely well.

The film opens with a gratuitous nyotaimori scene, showing a roomful of international businessmen eating sushi off the chests of five or six nude women, but radical feminists needn't concern themselves because Coixet makes sure to wag her finger at the practice by having the film’s soon-to-be griever Nagara (Takeo Nakahara) frown upon the display. But here’s the real kicker: the very same women are shown again in an arbitrary shower scene mere seconds after Nagara receives a distressing phone call informing him that his daughter has committed suicide. Not only is it one of the most out-of-place – and tasteless – scenes I’ve seen in, well, years, it’s also a mark of the poor craftsmanship and integrity that exudes in this film; not to mention the insufficient cultural research that was most likely doled out during production.

Nagara – alongside his faithful associate Ishida (Hideo Sakaki) – eventually discovers that his daughter’s suicide may link back to her recent breakup with David (Sergi López), a Spanish wine-seller based in Tokyo. Distraught over Nagara’s suffering, and personal matters of his own, Ishida hires Ryu (Rinko Kikuchi) – a fish-market employee who doubles as a hit-woman – to kill David and attain retribution. But Ishida’s act of vengeance is put on the backburner when romance blossoms between Ryu and her target.

What really threw me for a loop is how Coixet incorporates the film’s fifth player: a character simply referred to as “the narrator”, played by Min Tanaka, who gives a spectacularly nuanced performance, but like the rest of the cast, is cheated of better material. His intriguing setup in the beginning – from his observational musings of Ryu’s silent nature to his odd profession of audio engineer (one who records prosaic, but distinctive sounds) – is completely ousted the moment David and Ryu’s series of romantic trysts comes into play. Tanaka provides one hell of a compelling character, and it’s almost upsetting the way Coixet tunes out his potential. Having a narrator recount the story is swell, but if a director opts for the unconventional route and decides to play up the narrator’s role as a pivotal character, they should at least leave room for effective characterization.

The “love story” between Kikuchi and López that shadows any evidence of the narrator’s existence is largely forgettable, even bland compared to the quaint aspects of Tanaka’s few scenes. But like Tanaka, Kikuchi and López manage to somehow transcend the spiritless dialogue they’re given – animating flat lines in semi-coherent English – and their chemistry, while not electrifying, revolutionizes the norm. As I mentioned above, Coixet’s fixation here is clearly on visuals; capturing the colorful and “cute” features of Japan – all relatively embellished to re-establish the setting in case the viewer forgets – but her general handling of the scenery remains solid throughout, noteworthy even. Unfortunately, the compliments wane there. Pure technical exercise – and visual eye candy – opposed to an engrossing experience, Map of the Sounds of Tokyo exhibits ambition on the surface, but very little underneath.

6.5/10

There's something terrible about reality

RED DESERT (1964)

It’s amazing what color can do for a film. All that was sterile and desolate in Michelangelo Antonioni’s prior black and white films seem to take on a more cryptic form in Red Desert, the Italian director’s first foray into color film. The film’s working title – Celeste e verde or Light Blue and Green – denotes the significance of color in this postmodern landmark and Antonioni makes spectacular use of his resources to utilize dull, pastel colors as a means to illustrate the film’s jarring atmosphere. Being Antonioni’s first color film, his approach in Desert is unique and experimental, but reminiscences back on familiar themes – isolation, modernization – from his earlier films.

We find the director breaking new ground that allows him to express these themes more cognitively than ever before – while L’eclisse was primarily dependent on its bleak cinematography, Desert gave Antonioni free reign to manipulate environments with color; having his crew coat the ground and surrounding debris with muted colors and spray-paint forests black are just two examples. It was all an incentive to emphasize a haunting, but beautiful industrial world, one that Antonioni held no qualms against, but was in fact fascinated by. In the opposite corner is his protagonist – played by muse Monica Vitti – who reacts aversely to this world and shields herself from the reality of her condition. What Antonioni seeks to convey most in this film is that Giuliana’s neurotic tendencies are indeed amplified by her stark surroundings, but the root of her maladies runs much deeper than the director lets on.

Vitti plays Giuliana, an unhinged housewife recently released from the hospital after a severe car accident – which we later learn was the result of an attempted suicide. She feels estranged from her husband Ugo (Carlo Chionetti) a plant manager who is very much aligned with modernization and often dismisses Giuliana’s condition in order to make sexual advances. Giuliana’s anxiety also hampers her ability to connect with her son who, like his father, seems more inclined to adapt to industrialization than shun it. She's eventually introduced to Ugo’s partner Zeller (Richard Harris) who’s in Italy for business and appears to understand her troubles far more intuitively than her husband ever has. But what appears to be a budding romance on the surface for Giuliana and Zeller ultimately foreshadows their inability to communicate with each other.

There’s something deceptive, but compelling about the relationship that develops between Giuliana and Zeller. Although both manage their plights from two different ends of the spectrum, they relate in feeling alienated from the industrial world. We're able to discern that these two characters are at a compromising stage in their lives, yet neither is willing to compromise with the society they live in.

As the film progresses it becomes clear that both Giuliana and Zeller seek to avoid this bourgeoning society filled with factories and large scale manufacturers, but despite feeling so close to one another, there’s still some dissonance in their communication. Zeller, with all his machismo and fortitude, has successfully realized his fantasies of escape – he’s constantly traveling to recruit new workers from all over. This, however, is merely an illusion of escape, and by the end of the film Giuliana – who’s bound to the objects and people around her, thus incapable of escaping – realizes that she can no longer seek refuge in a man who’s just as crippled as she is.

Apparently Ingmar Bergman – one of my favorite directors of all time – detested Monica Vitti’s performance in this film, but amusingly enough I’d rank Vitti’s work in Desert alongside Ingrid Thulin’s best in any of his films, including The Silence. I suppose he found her a pinch too intense, but the most difficult aspect about playing neurotic characters is finding a balance between going too far and not going far enough. The mannerisms, ticks and nuances that comprise the standard unstable protagonist pose a complex challenge for actors; a single slipup could prompt a comically theatrical performance. But Vitti manages to circumvent caricature and achieve a remarkably understated portrayal of a woman inflicted with severe neurosis without taking things too far.

I suppose Desert can be interpreted as a grim social commentary on industrialization, but as I mentioned above, Antonioni actually loved the idea of progress and found factories beautiful – obviously they played a large role in inspiring the film's concept. The art direction only further confirms this; blurring out characters and placing objects in the foreground to insinuate the importance and potential of technology, etc. As for Giuliana’s cold reception to the modern world, Antonioni’s merely suggesting that many individuals – especially during the industrial revolution that was unfolding during this period – were unable to adapt to such a social metamorphosis and therefore were impaired psychologically. Giuliana is a representation of those who failed to make the transition from the natural world to the industrial one, and Vitti's performance encapsulates that demographic wonderfully.

8/10

What kind of man are you?

LE SAMOURAI (1967)

I was first introduced, cinematically, to French filmmaker Jean-Pierre Melville in Godard’s Breathless, where he makes a rather satirical cameo appearance as a highbrow novelist near the film’s climax. Little did I know that the man I was watching churn out existentialist nonsense was also the man behind a number of exceptional films including Les enfants terribles, Army of Shadows, and of course, the film I’ve decided to review, Le Samourai. Some of his more enthusiastic contemporaries have actually dubbed him as the “father of the French New Wave,” but naturally, many – including myself – would argue otherwise.

He followed the New Wave rules of thumb (filming on location, working on a budget, etc.) but like most foreign directors, he was also known for conforming to American influences; drawing comparisons between Samourai and noir films like This Gun For Hire isn’t exactly a chore. I suppose this western charm was one of many factors that contributed towards his success, but despite Melville’s mainstream appeal, the fact remains that he established himself outside of the studio system, preferring to adhere to his roots in New Wave cinema throughout most of his career. Samourai is a great example of how he trades in big-studio customs for a more subtle, independent approach. Melville took a typical "genre film" and reworked the more conventional elements in order to craft something truly abstract. Samourai is slow, meticulous, and unwavering; attributes you wouldn’t expect in a standard, shoot-em'-up thriller, but here they work beautifully.

The film opens with a line written by Melville that refers to the film’s Bushido (“Way of the Warrior”) influence: “There is no greater solitude than that of the samurai unless it is that of the tiger in the jungle… Perhaps…”. Following this seemingly cryptic text, we’re introduced to our “samurai” who goes by “Jef Costello” (Alain Delon), a contract killer hired to off a nightclub owner. Like clockwork, Costello devises a methodical double-alibi – involving his girlfriend (Nathalie Delon, Alain’s real-life wife) and a late-night card game with a group of shady individuals – before he commits the crime.

Despite these painstaking measures, he’s eventually apprehended for homicide, but is let off due to insubstantial evidence supporting his arrest – although the station’s inspector (Francois Perier) remains a bit overzealous about indicting him. But this isn’t exactly good news for Costello. His employer wasn’t expecting him to get caught, so in classic gangster vein, Costello’s contractor orders one of his goons to dispose of him. Making matters worse, the dogged police inspector from earlier becomes determined to somehow fetch Costello and charge him for the murder. With fluid, ninja-like strategies, Costello must now avoid two oppositions who are tracking his every move.

Samourai isn’t traditionally “New Wave”, but it also isn’t built around an accelerated plotline with stylized action sequences. What I loved most about Samourai was its ability to move fast at a slow pace. Melville is instinctively aware that the audience’s excitement lies in the mounting tensions before the action takes place, and that’s essentially what this film is; a large build-up of tension. There’s only two moments of fatal violence in the entire film – one at the beginning and one at the end. Both scenes are almost identical in execution and in a way bring the film full circle. The events that occur between these crucial moments are conveyed in the most minimalist manner and handled with a controlled sense of direction; Samourai knows where it’s going and how it intends to get there.

Dialogue is scarce and only implemented when absolutely necessary. Character development is motivated by plot, not vice versa. Costello’s actions and mannerisms are subdued in even the most hostile environments. It’s, oddly enough, – given the genre – a quiet film, but it makes sure not to sit statically in place. The story doesn’t exactly echo the high-octane antics of the Bond or Bourne series’, but it manages to come across as far more genuine in terms of the way an expert in this field would actually behave. Naturally, the film has its inauthentic moments – there isn’t a police department I can think of that would dispense that much manpower for a single homicide case – but nonetheless, Samourai is still a gem to behold. It’s truly cinema in its finest, most succinct form.

8.5/10

Will time pass and roses fade?

POETRY (2010)

German art director Hermann Warm – known for his distorted set designs in Robert Wiene’s The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari – once said that “films must be drawings brought to life,” and if there was anyone who knew how to breathe expressive verve into a film, it was Warm; his work in the early years of German film not only spoke for itself, evoking dark pathos through mere appearance, but also established the art director as a key figure in the birthing of German expressionism.

While watching Lee Chang-dong’s Poetry, Warm’s quote felt incredibly relevant to what Chang-dong had achieved on screen; his ability to balance both heavy and light themes through visual projection without resorting to the conventions of sentimental tearjerkers – instead framing the often disregarded beauty of everyday life around perverse subject matter – is warm, breathtaking and, despite the events that unravel, an uplifting experience. It’s a reaffirmation that beauty can be found in even the bleakest of circumstances, the coldest of individuals; all explored in Chang-dong’s grim illustration inspirited by the joys of life and nature.

The opening of Poetry struck me as a throw-back to Fellini’s Nights of Cabiria, except here our drownee’s motives were intentional; we find the body of a schoolgirl floating facedown in a riverbank, muddied up, lifeless, and eventually learn that she decided to commit suicide after months of being raped by a group of six schoolboys. One of these schoolboys happens to be the ill-bred grandson (Da-wit Lee) of Mija (Jeong-hie Yun), a woman in her sixties weathering through bouts with Alzheimer’s and barely scraping by on government subsidies and a part-time maid job; yet her wardrobe is considered “chic”.

Said to have a “poet’s vein”, Mija enrolls in a poetry class that challenges her to “see” the beauty around her and become inspired by it. Of course, this proves difficult after being approached by the father (Nae-sang Ahn) of her grandson’s friend Kibum who requests that she – along with the fathers of her grandson’s other pals – persuade the suicide victim’s mother to settle outside of court; obviously to avert media spectacle and ensure their sons' futures. Cornered on all sides by apathy and immorality, Mija struggles to attain the perception she needs to reach the zenith of poetic inspiration.

The capacity at which Chang-dong streams his ideas in Poetry – both sentiments of beauty and the fouler aspects of humanity – is unwavering and cements his capability as a director with a point to nail. His concrete look at corruption isn’t brutal or gritty, but rather understated and unobtrusive, yet still effective in elucidating the film’s major themes.

Chang-dong manages to contrast elements of beauty with despair in many scenes; one of my favorites being Mija’s lighthearted conversation with the victim’s mother out in the boondocks about gorgeous scenery, apricots and bountiful harvests, all wonderful subjects, but none pertaining to the dark incident she came there to address. Earlier we find Mija in a doctor’s office being diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, scrutinizing a bouquet of artificial camellias – which she describes as “flowers of winter, flowers of pain,” providing another instance of anguish found in something beautiful. The way that Chang-dong presents his motifs is crystallized to a point of immediate comprehension, but much of Poetry’s basis, like actual poetry, is left to the viewer’s own interpretation.

The ingenious placement of benign, restrained actress Jeong-hie Yun amongst such self-interested and crooked characters – in itself – is an uncovering of beauty within corruption, leading us to posit the film as a metaphor for something specific, yet the depth that Chang-dong hollows out from such a simple story is practically bottomless; infinite readings can be spun from his creation. Poetry’s final shots are brilliant, summing up 2010’s most touching film with lines from Mija’s poem that symbolizes departure – death – but in a manner that portrays it as something splendid.

9/10

It takes two to love, as it takes two to hate

THE LAST METRO (1980)

Overlooking its penchant for melodrama and formalism as well as its domineering theatrics, Francois Truffaut’s The Last Metro strikes a personal, humanistic chord that rang more introspective than I had anticipated. Perhaps the prevalence of war motifs helped anchor the nuances of realism found underneath Metro’s gaudy color palette, but the way confinement is perpetrated as this powerful central theme is poetically human.

What’s most fascinating about Truffaut’s approach in Metro is the way he perceives the foreboding grip that Germany held on France during their occupation in World War II; it’s subtle, yet simultaneously intense. The cliche of Nazi Germany’s menacing ways also isn’t illustrated quite the way you’d expect in Metro; in fact, it’s virtually absent. However, the hostilities that France was subjected to during Germany’s occupation echoes loudly in Truffaut and Suzanne Schiffman’s script. But the nature of war and marginalization eventually take a backseat to a more romantic tale.

The Last Metro documents the trials of Theatre Montmartre, a French theatre struggling with censors and other torments during Germany's occupation of Paris. Marion Steiner (Catherine Deneuve), the director – and in some senses matriarch – of this theatre somehow handles distressful predicaments with calm and ease, including the sheltering of her Jewish husband and former theatre director Lucas Steiner (Heinz Bennent) from the Nazis. From the theatre’s cellar, Lucas begins to use Marion as a conduit to oversee production of an upcoming play via notes, suggestions and even light criticisms toward Marion herself. The integrity of their marriage is ultimately tested by Bernard Granger (Gerard Depardieu), an aspiring resistance member who plays Marion’s romantic opposite on stage.

Metro accomplishes all the standard truisms you’d expect to find in a melodrama centralizing on the theatre; backstage elements, scandalous affairs, etc. But what separates Metro from films like To Be or Not to Be is the painstaking detail imbued into Truffaut’s script. A great portion of this detail can be accredited to Truffaut’s childhood, which saw accounts of black marketing and the like on several occasions. Subtleties like women drawing stocking facades on their legs or Parisians smuggling black market hams in cello cases – instances all witnessed by Truffaut – serve as a distinctive border between Metro and his other melodramatic works; see The Story of Adele H.

The strict confinement of action to Theatre Montmartre is my only quibble with Metro, yet this sense of confinement has a way of alienating the viewer in the same way Lucas is alienated in his cellar, so perhaps it’s simply clever symbolism on Truffaut's part. Deneuve, Depardieu and Bennent all play their roles convincingly enough to pull off a rather complex love triangle, but the element of romanticism is undercut by the vagueness of this triangle; which is especially vague in Lucas’ sudden familiarity with Marion’s affection for Bernard. There’s also a little resistance subplot involving Bernard that materializes infrequently alongside the central plot; an exciting angle wasted.

Although I don’t view Metro as an actors’ film where mesmerizing performances take center stage – though Deneuve performs wonderfully outside her element – it does manage to convey the climate of occupation realistically as well as the conditions that Jewish civilians in France lived under during the war. The notion of displacement and the subsequent pathos that emerge is a remarkably profound subject, and the script is more than effective in getting that across. Having only seen a handful of Truffaut films, I’d rank Metro amongst my favorites.

8/10

Why deny the obvious necessity of remembering?

HIROSHIMA MON AMOUR (1959)

Far from my favorite nouvelle vague director, but equally far from the ones I abhor, Alain Resnais’ individual approach to themes of memory and forgetfulness has never seemed quite as fundamental as it does in Hiroshima mon amour. Where Last Year at Marienbad was cleverly abstract and even a bit daunting, Hiroshima seems to cater more to the layman unfamiliar with Resnais’ work. Its atmosphere is also more accessible in the sense that it envelops a crisis we’re all familiar with – the atomic bombing of Hiroshima – and analyzes the notion of how similar events often have a way of re-socializing individuals for better or worse. At heart, Hiroshima is a story of love and intimacy, but layering that is a trial between two lovers burdened by traumatic pasts, somehow managing to cope with life after tragedy.

Like Marienbad, the lovers followed in Hiroshima remain unidentified throughout the course of the film. The opening sequence is not unlike a documentary in detailing the morbid devastation caused by the Hiroshima bombing in 1945. Narrating this sequence is an actress, referred to as “She” (Emmanuelle Riva) by most critics, filming in Hiroshima who becomes embroiled in an affair with a married Japanese architect referred to as “He” (Eiji Okada). After their brief fling, the two prepare to part ways, but find themselves constantly gravitating back to one another. Through poetic vignettes and reminiscent dialogue, they begin to reflect on the bombing’s aftermath, gradually reaching a sense of Riva’s past and how it juxtaposes the terror witnessed by the victims of that fatal August morning.

The structure that Resnais employs in Hiroshima has a more conventional feel to it than the hodgepodge of contradicting scenes in Marienbad. The memory motif is also more effectively realized here, as flashbacks to Riva’s past are introduced with lucid, but subtle cuts. Perhaps all that was innovative and uniquely disorienting in Marienbad is lost on Hiroshima, but the unambiguous path from beginning to end is far and away more reassuring. In fact, many of the concepts Resnais attempted to convey in Marienbad seemed more deliberated and thought out in Hiroshima. The idea of forgetfulness, a theme returned to occasionally in Hiroshima, reaches its boiling point in the film’s climax as Riva’s character becomes a symbol of love’s forgetfulness and the brevity and dismay that culminates after a compelling affair.

Hiroshima is largely successful in depicting the mythos of memory on-screen on a personable level, making it easier for viewers to relate to the story in some individual sense. The lovers here aren’t statues or phlegmatic puzzle pieces we’re forced to jam into some convenient slot in order to understand. They’re carefully developed individuals who, for lack of anything else, demonstrate the draining of self and identity more powerfully than I’ve witnessed in any Resnais film thus far. Hiroshima is certainly a landmark of its genre and traces of its influence are notable in the works of many classic and modern filmmakers. For me, it’s one more step towards fully appreciating Alain’s craft.

8/10