Laura: One of your children has posed a curious question: if the world is round, why is a frozen lake flat? John: That's a good question. Laura: Ah, here it says that Lake Ontario curves more than 3 degrees from its Eastern end to its Western end. So frozen water really isn't flat. John: Nothing is what it seems.
This brief exchange in the opening minutes of Nicolas Roeg’s Don’t Look Now comes about as close as is possible to understanding one of cinema’s most difficult films. The movie, equally an existential search for understanding, an examination of grief and coping with loss, and a study of faith and doubt, is one that constantly keeps a definitive explanation at arm’s length. With its myriad of visual motifs, fluid concept of time, and fragmented style of editing, it’s a movie that encourages audiences to interpret, while at the same time resists interpretation. The movie’s ending doesn’t make any grand proclamations of intent, instead providing the audience with more confusion. Roeg has gone on record as stating, “For me, the basic premise is that in life, nothing is what it seems.” Not to get too philosophical, but at its core, it’s a movie that reflects man’s internal struggle with his world – that constant need to understand or believe, despite not being able to fully do either. It’s about trusting what you know, not necessarily what is known. The fact that all of this is infused into a tragic ghost story makes it all the more wonderful.
The film, adapted from Daphne du Maurier’s short story of the same name, ends up being one of the most literate examples of moviemaking in film history. Everything about the film – the narrative, editing, setting, imagery, score, acting, etc. – is a means to an end. The story isn’t going to provide many answers on its own, but, combined with all the other elements involved in crafting a film, it is able to create meaning. Oddly, despite being a Hollywood favorite (she had many short stories and novels adapted into movies, among them Hitchcock’s 1940 Best Picture winner, Rebecca, and his 1963 film, The Birds), du Maurier wasn’t considered an exceptionally literary author. It speaks quite a bit to Roeg’s directorial talent that he was able to mount such hefty ambitions onto what is a rather straightforward horror tale.
This is a movie that uses so much more than just a narrative to get its message across; focusing on the plot to analyze this film would leave you puzzled at best. The story concerns a couple, John and Laura Baxter (Donald Sutherland and Julie Christie), who have to deal with the death of their daughter, Christine Baxter (Sharon Williams). They temporarily relocate to Venice because John has been hired to restore a dilapidated church. In Venice, weird shit starts happening. What do all of these weird things mean? Do they mean anything at all?
What the film does impeccably is marry its story with film technique. The editing intentionally meshes and confuses time. We often see things from the past or future in shots of the present. For instance, take the sex scene between John and Laura. We have a passionate sex scene between two grief stricken parents intercut with the mundaneness of them getting dressed to go out afterwards. It blends time and two seemingly unrelated acts (intercourse and getting dressed) to show the drastic difference between each partner’s method of coping. This is a couple that’s coping with the loss of a child, yet they still have the desire to express their love for one another. However, afterwards Laura is seemingly on the path to recovery while John turns to alcohol. The meshing of time makes the point that time itself isn’t going to heal the couple’s wounds – only directly dealing with them will. There are a number of examples where the film is edited for a similar effect, all to make the point that time is illusory. Our behavior and feelings are influenced by past, present, and future, and the film attempts to condense that all into one.
The way Roeg uses symbolic imagery and motifs throughout the film is another way he adds to the narrative. Water, glass, and pictures all recur to create meaning. The film frequently shows glass breaking before something terrible happens (Christine’s death, John falling in the church, Laura fainting at dinner), which serves as a reminder of how tragedy and coping with grief can shatter even the most healthy family. The film closely associates water with death. Christine drowns at the beginning of the film, bodies are dragged from canals in Venice, even Venice itself, a city where waterways are common modes of transportation, is being ravaged by a serial killer. With water being the most essential component to sustain life, Roeg is able to turn the idea on its head in an effort to comment on the precarious link between life and death.
The recurring pictures are part of a larger doubles motif throughout the film. John, an architect, looks at pictures of the church he is restoring and the real thing. He also takes tiles from a mosaic in need of repair and attempts to differentiate between the manufactured and the authentic tiles. Part of this “doubling” involves people as well, as a handful of times throughout the film people are mistaken for someone else. In fact, the ending of the film is an example of this idea. Roeg’s point is made clearest with this motif – in a world where “nothing is what is seems” how can one tell the difference between a fake and the real thing?
Don’t Look Now is a movie that uses everything a movie possibly can to create meaning. It’s a movie I wish happened more often, but I’ll take it when I can get it. Roeg creates an atmosphere, mood, and uses specific film techniques throughout his story to compliment it. Everything about the movie is done to convey its theme to the audience. It’s a film that demands multiple viewings, but will also likely reward them. In short, it’s a very different kind of film than audiences are used to. Still, it’s a wonderful one and is instantly among my favorite horror movies.
Adolescence, that romanticized period of great suffering, seems like the most natural point of entry for the torture porn film. Having seen 2009’s Australian import, The Loved Ones, I’m left wondering what took so long. Teenagers make for great fictional fodder, and there’s no kind of film that can depict suffering of any sort better than torture porn. The result is a wholly original take on a typical, standard horror story.
Writer/director Sean Byrne’s debut film follows main character Brent Mitchell (Xavier Samuel) as he attempts to deal with the guilt of killing his father in a car accident. Brent’s ways of dealing with that guilt are as misguided as you would expect from an adolescent. He smokes weed, cuts himself with a razor, and ponders suicide. His lone source of hope is his girlfriend Holly (Victoria Thane). One day at school, fellow classmate Lola Stone (Robin McLeavy) asks Brent to prom, and he politely refuses because he’s already planning on going with his girlfriend. It’s quite a nice rejection, and there’s no reason to think Lola would take offense. However, what Brent, and the entire town, doesn’t know, is that Lola and her father, Daddy Stone (John Brumpton), are about as sane as Leatherface’s parents. Brent goes for a walk on the day of the dance, is attacked as he listens to music, and finds himself being held captive in the home of the Stones. From that point on, the film decidedly earns its torture porn label.
Instead of simply showing the audience Brent’s ordeal with Lola and her father, which ends up being about as standard a torture porn trope as you could find, Byrne juxtaposes the happenings with some good, old-fashioned, grounded in reality, teenage angst. Brent’s best pal Jamie (Richard Wilson) ends up going to the dance with his dream girl, the goth Mia (Jessica McNamee). It’s this plot line, which in a lesser filmmaker’s hands would feel superfluous and unrelated, that manages to give the film a little more substance than one would initially expect. I’ll spare the details since the movie reveals them slowly, but it’s fair to call Mia one psychologically fucked up chick. Like Brent, she’s incapable of healthily dealing with her problems, and resorts to drinking, drugs, and fucking to release her pain. Some might fault the film for how open ended it leaves this plot line, but any sort of resolution would be forced and condescending. Mia’s predicament isn’t something that just gets better. We end up getting a full picture of who Mia is, and that’s all that’s necessary for the film since her character exists as a point of contrast. If anything, the film ties itself together a little too neatly. Everything and everyone is connected. The point, I guess, is to show the impact Lola and her father’s serial killings have had on everyone in the town, but it doesn’t really feel important. We’re drawn to the film because of the teenagers, and anything else just feels unnecessary.
The real strength of the movie is the aforementioned teenage characters. Byrne manages to create a handful of characters that are fairly representative of the teenage experience in a running time of less than 90 minutes. They may be broadly drawn, but I’d argue that most teenagers are anyway. The people they are aren’t exactly people everyone knew as a teenager, but they’re close enough. The film creates a hyper stylized, incredibly violent version of teenage life. Brent’s the loner who does what he wants; Lola’s the spoiled rotten brat whose parents cow-towed to her every wish; Holly’s the popular, pretty girl; Mia’s the goth chick with issues; and Jamie is the typical male friend who’s only looking to get laid. The only difference is in this world, the princess gets to lobotomize her crushes so she can keep them forever and torture them the way she feels tortured.
The film’s concerns with the uniqueness of being a teen isn’t quite The Breakfast Club (it’s about a step or two down in terms of insight), but it counteracts that with gory, grisly violence and a very dark sense of humor. Unlike most torture porn movies, The Loved Ones doesn’t bog itself down with simply trying to gross its audience out. The requisite gore and violence is certainly present, but it strives for a bit more, and that’s always a worthy aim. Those looking for a straight torture porn movie in the vein of the Saw films might not be happy with Byrne’s film, and art-house audiences might find its bluntness off-putting. It’s destined to be a cult film once it finds itself an audience.
Most movie watchers are accustomed to horror films where the horror arises strictly from situations the characters encounter through plot development. In that regard, 1973’s The Wicker Man is a different breed of horror film entirely. The story unfolds more like a slow burn thriller (with the occasional odd musical interlude) than it does anything resembling your typical scary movie. In fact, until The Big Reveal of the last 10-15 minutes, it’s tough to even consider it a horror film. The movie is much more concerned with the ideas and causes behind what is taking place than it is with strictly what is taking place. It ends up being a picture that’s less visceral and more intellectual – one that’s scarier when you sit down and think about it.
The film’s plot is rather simple: Sergeant Howie (Edward Woodward) comes to the island of Summerisle to investigate the disappearance of a young girl. Howie is met with indifference and resistance when he starts his investigation. As the investigation moves along, Howie soon realizes he’s being told lies and suspects a town-wide cover up of the girl’s death. While the story deals solely with Howie’s investigation, that doesn’t even begin to scratch the surface of what the movie is really about.
The key to the movie is the contrast between Howie’s devout Christianity and the inhabitants of Summerisle’s devout Paganism. It’s all tied into the narrative about the missing girl, but there’s no mistaking by the end of the film that the religious aspect is what’s been more important throughout. Howie sees the islanders as heathens, and they see him as a fool. Neither accepts the other as anything more than a weirdo or outsider, and that’s where the film’s main source of conflict arises. Both Howie and the people of Summerisle see the world through their separate religious perspectives. There’s no way they’re ever going to understand one another or learn to coexist because they’re unable to comprehend why someone would be different in the first place. These people are all living as if their one way is the only possible way.
There’s a sequence in the middle of the film where our “hero” visits the island’s local schoolhouse that goes a long way to explaining exactly what this film is about. After chastising the teacher’s methods as “corrupting the young” (because, you know, since he’s a Christian police officer, he’s an authority on these things), Howie shows the students (all girls) a picture of the missing girl, and asks if they know who she is. They claim they don’t, but Howie notices an empty desk and asks whose it is. When he takes a look at the desk, he opens it up and sees a beetle walking around a nail that it’s tied to with a piece of string. The creepy young girl looks at him and says, “The little old beetle goes 'round and 'round. Always the same way, y'see, until it ends up right up tight to the nail. Poor old thing!” It’s a wonderful visualization of the movie’s theme – that people who blindly follow anything (in this case religion) are ultimately controlled by that thing, and end up “right up tight to the nail”. In addition to showing how the theme applies to Howie, just before the schoolhouse scene begins, the sergeant is watching the school’s male students parade around a wooden pole while holding long streamers attached to the pole. It’s a visual parallel to the beetle going around the nail used to condemn the townspeople’s way of life just as much as Howie’s. These sorts of subtle visual metaphors are all over the film (the ending visually echoes Christ’s walk to the cross), and I imagine rewatching the movie would be rewarding.
It should be noted that The Wicker Man has a number of flaws. For all the inspired moments of visual metaphor, there are far too many moments of dullness. At times, the way certain information is relayed to the viewer is uninvolving. For instance, Lord Summerisle (Christopher Lee) and Howie have a long talk about Paganism that ends up being a clumsy way to communicate his back-story and his religion to the audience. There’s another instance where Howie is reading a book on Paganism in the library where, via voiceover, the contents of the book are relayed to the audience. Again, that’s a sloppy and uninteresting way of giving the audience information.
There’s also the problem with the way the main character is presented. Howie functions as something of a surrogate for the audience. We’re invited to see things the way he does since he’s the typical “hero” of these kinds of movies. I imagine this was a more successful tactic in 1973 than in 2012, as being open minded about religion has become a bit more typical. Plus, the fact that Howie is an uptight jerk makes him a difficult character to relate to unless you’re also an uptight jerk. This misstep ends up being the film’s most significant fault. The ending, where it’s revealed that the townspeople have orchestrated the entire missing girl case as a test of Howie’s faith (they need his pure faith to make a successful sacrifice to their Pagan gods), would have been incredibly affecting if the movie had spent time making us root for Howie. Instead, we get a really smart, clever condemnation of everyone, but one that is emotionally hollow. You get the sense that Howie gets what he deserves rather than the complete shock that would result from identifying with him. I’m not necessarily against an unlikable protagonist, but the lack of identification with literally everyone in the film, made this a hard one for me to care about. As stated earlier, it’s more of an intellectual exercise than anything else. However, the movie successfully makes its point, which is something that’s always appreciated.
The Wicker Man was a movie that initially left me feeling a bit indifferent, but the more I contemplated the ideas of the film, the more I appreciated what it is trying to do and how smart it really is. I can’t give it an unconditional recommendation, but it’s definitely a movie I can see getting better with repeated viewings. It’s much more invested in its visuals than its story (especially at the end; I can’t stress enough how smart it is), which is something to be appreciated for a horror film. There just isn’t enough feeling in it for me to agree with the film’s exquisite reputation.
Disclaimer: I'm switching the format for this month in order to write
about horror films. There won't be a money shot, just a review/analysis
of 15 different horror movies this month. Since I haven't posted in a
while, 15 in one month might seem like a daunting task to some. Not me.
The definitive moment in 1984’s horror/sci-fi comedy Night of the Comet takes place about halfway through the film as humanity’s last hope, teenage sisters Reggie and Sam Belmont (Catherine Mary Stewart and Kelli Maroney, respectively), parade around a seemingly vacant shopping mall trying on the latest trends in 80s teen fashion while Cyndi Lauper’s “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun” blares from the speakers. No one’s going to accuse the moment of being subtle, but it does manage to get the movie’s point across. It doesn’t matter if it’s a girl or a guy – teenagers just want to have fun.
That message, trite and unsophisticated as it may be, fits the B-movie vibe of the film like a glove. The film’s effects were probably dated a week after production wrapped, and the highest praise I can give the acting is passable at best. The rough plot – Earth passes through the tail of a comet that ends up killing most of the planet’s population and morphing the rest into zombie-like fiends, save for a select few who accidentally or knowingly barricade themselves under steel enforced structures – is nothing more than an amalgam of just about every late night cable horror/sci-fi movie you’ve ever seen. If you’re reminded of The Omega Man (made 12 years prior and itself a remake of 1964’s The Last Man on Earth and also remade in 2007 as I Am Legend), or the original Dawn of the Dead, you’re on the right track. Countless (bad) movies that no one remembers have been made using a similar premise as well. Night of the Comet has little in common with those films (the good ones or the bad ones) in the details or spirit, and that ultimately makes it a much different film than its predecessors.
In addition to the horror/sci-fi combo, the film mixes in another genre that was wildly popular at the time: the teen comedy. It ends up being the movie’s most interesting aspect and the main reason it rises above the cheese-fests it initially appears to hold as brethren. You can’t really talk about the 80s in film without mentioning the titanic wave of teen comedies. Whether you’re talking about Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Porky’s, the Revenge of the Nerds series, Teen Wolf, Back to the Future, Say Anything, Heathers, or the vast majority of John Hughes’ filmography, you just can’t ignore the sheer number of successful teen films made during the decade. In 1984, Night of the Comet fell firmly within a Hollywood culture that was very interested in making money off of teenagers and their plight. So, what we end up with is a mesh of horror/sci-fi and 80s teen comedy. It’s a unique sort of genre blending, and probably something only possible in the 80s.
The movie is worth seeing and praising because of how it manages to convey a tone that’s completely at odds with the world it creates. Someone searching for some deeper meaning might say that the conflict between the film’s background influences (horror/sci-fi films) and it’s more upfront influences (teen comedies) reflects the mindset of your typical teenager at odds with the teenage and adult worlds. The movies referenced by the plot give the viewer an automatic expectation of a movie that’s about survival and the loneliness of being the last few people on Earth. However, the film only generically touches on any of that. As the referenced scene at the beginning of this write-up alludes to, survival comes second to being fashionable. Hell, one might even make the case that in a teenager’s world, being fashionable is essential to survival.
There’s a clever one-liner towards the end where Sam “surprisingly” shows up in the nick of time to rescue Reggie that illustrates just how concerned the movie is with celebrating teenage life. Instead of Reggie giving Sam a hug or thanking her for saving her life, she utters the line, “cute outfit.” It’s certainly a girly, cheesy moment, but it’s played for laughs and works well within the context of the film.
Let’s also take a look at how the girls are able to survive the comet in the first place. It’s mentioned that being within a steel structure is the probable reason the comet doesn’t turn the girls into burnt orange dust. However, the reasons they’re in those steel structures in the first place are more important to the movie than them simply being underneath steel beams. Reggie is holing up in the projection room of the movie theater where she works to have sex with her boyfriend. It’s also worth mentioning that she lied to her step mother about where she would be for the night. Sam gets into an actual fight with her nasty, bitch of a stepmother, and runs away from home and sleeps in a yard shed. It’s also later revealed that Hector (the last man on Earth, and the man the girls bicker about) spent the night in the bed of his steel truck with a woman he recently picked up. The point is all three are behaving like normal teenagers by lying to their parents, fighting with their parents, having sex, and running away from home. Since we’ve all seen Scream and know the “rules of horror movies”, these actions would normally land them all as the first victims of the film. Instead, these kids aren’t killed for acting irresponsibly, but are rewarded for their actions and become the heroes of our movie.
The film’s final act introduces us to a group of scientists who prepared for the comet’s arrival by creating an underground bunker. They’re working on a serum that they hope will cure those who survived but are being turned into zombies. The idea behind this plot thread is to serve as a point of contrast to the teenagers. The scientists represent the adult world’s conservativeness and selfishness. The group eventually becomes exposed to the virus because of a silly little detail they overlooked. They begin coaxing younger people (teenagers and children) into their underground bunker, in order to use them as guinea pigs to find a cure. They are quite literally sucking the life out of these kids. The point is that by not trying to safeguard against every possible negative outcomes, and instead having some fun, you’ll live a better life. It’s an interesting way to state your point, but this plot development bogs the film down and takes away from the unadulterated fun vibe the first two-thirds of the film has.
Given the odd combination of movie genres that make up Night of the Comet, it’s easy to see why this is more of a cult film than a classic from the 80s. To me, a movie described as a teenage zombie comedy is something I’m going to make a point of seeing. That’s because I’m awesome. Not everyone is, and that’s something we all have to come to terms with. Night of the Comet isn’t a great, or scary, movie, but it’s a fun one because of its attention to detail, clever writing, and energy. There’s more brains put into this than you would expect, and more than in virtually any blockbuster made today. I appreciated the effort and the result.
Disclaimer: This is not a Money Shot. Since the movie is still new and in theaters, it isn't possible to legally get any clips of the film. However, since I wrote almost 2000 words on the movie and have nowhere else to put it, it's going on this blog. That is all.
One would think a movie with numerous speeches about freedom, explicit reference to Weapons of Mass Destruction, manipulative government organizations withholding information, and a climactic battle that destroys a huge chunk of New York City (in Manhattan no less!) would border on heavy handed. Instead, if you read the reviews or listen to moviegoer reactions to Joss Whedon’s newest blockbuster to top all blockbusters, The Avengers, you’d find the masses calling it “exciting”, “action packed”, “fun”, “a thrill ride”, and, my personal favorite, “mindless entertainment”. It boggles my mind that a film that so proudly wears its intentions on its sleeve, that’s so obviously about the War on Terror, is being seen as nothing more than the latest easily digested, quickly forgotten, summer popcorn action flick. To quote Marge Gunderson, “Well…I just don’t understand it.”
So, in an effort to spark some discussion, open some eyes, and get a movie I can’t stop thinking about out of my head, I’m here to give an analysis of the film that hopefully shows just how unmindless (totally a made up word) the movie is. Even if no one agrees with the thoughts I put forth, I’ll feel better getting them out of my brain. I feel like I have to avenge The Avengers. I’ll take solace in knowing that the movie with the largest box office take for an opening weekend IN THE HISTORY OF MOVIES(!!!) isn’t some insipid piece of action porn from the Michael Bay school of filmmaking, but a real movie that puts forth a legitimate worldview, and has a real, worthy agenda. And with that, I promise no more flabbergasted exasperation or whining – just film analysis.
Ok, I lied. We aren’t going to analyze the film just yet, but at least I won’t be whining. Before we get into any analysis of the movie, we should briefly talk about Joss Whedon. He wrote and directed the film, and anyone who’s familiar with his previous work will tell you he’s a writer’s writer. His biggest strength is his ability to create characters you truly care about and mesh those characters with whatever ideas and statements he’s trying to get through to the audience. His work is always about something. He doesn’t just take characters through a plot and tell a story. Why anyone thought The Avengers would be any different because it had a big budget, I don’t know (shit…that probably counts as whining). Whedon’s stuck mostly to TV (the only other movie he’s directed was Serenity (2005), which was based on his cancelled TV show Firefly and mostly made to wrap that series up), which employs a much longer format that naturally allows for more character development than a 2-3 hour film. He also typically works with ensemble casts and has experience writing comic books. So, to recap, he’s an idea guy who is good with working with lots of characters and has experience in comics. I mean, could you ask for a better fit to helm The Avengers?
At this point you might be asking, “What idea is this guy working with this time? Good guys stop bad guy from taking over the world?” Well…yeah. That’s exactly the idea he’s working with. Only it isn’t the idea that a supervillain from another universe is going to take over the world by using his super powers. Ok, well, it is, but there’s this tricky little thing in works of fiction called allegory that allows what’s literally taking place throughout the entire story to stand for something else altogether. In this sense, Loki = terrorist (more specifically, power hungry terrorist meets Shakespearean Iago). In this same vein, The Avengers represent society as a whole. The movie contrasts these two concepts through the characters in the film to arrive at a very specific point – that the people within a society, through their beliefs and actions, ultimately decide what that society stands for. Those who fight for a cause bigger than themselves will always prevail over those fighting for purely selfish interests. In order for that to happen, however, the individuals that comprise said society must make it happen. As a society, we can’t be more than the sum total of all the individuals within. We make what happens happen (of course, it helps if you have an Iron Man suit to help you make things happen). How does the movie say all this? Well, now it’s time for some good old-fashioned film analysis:
Whedon is a better writer than director (which is why he’s so good on TV), so it makes sense for a lot of the film’s ideas to be told through dialogue and character interactions. However, that doesn’t mean the movie isn't without its moments of visual prowess. There are, at least, a handful of individual shots and scenes that convey the movie’s concepts visually. To start, let’s take a look at the relationship between Loki and The Avengers, since their dueling ideologies are the film’s main source of conflict.
As already mentioned, the movie contrasts these characters (and what they stand for) to make its main point. First, there’s Loki. He brings war to Earth for purely selfish reasons. He wants to get back at Thor and the rest of Asgard and wants to accumulate power while doing so. He wants to rule the world with fear, enslave the human race, and will kill whoever is in his path. It isn’t the biggest leap of faith to see him as a terrorist. He even tries to infect the minds of the people he meets to show them the advantages to his way of thinking (and quite literally does so to the minds and hearts of Hawkeye and others with his scepter). Loki’s biggest problem is someone like him can never “win” because one of two things will always happen: 1. He'll run into someone/some group fighting for the same reasons, and he’ll lose. This is pointed out to him by the old man who refuses to kneel before him in Germany: “There will always be men like you.” Captain America even references Hitler immediately afterwards when he saves the old man’s life. 2. He'll run into someone/some group fighting for a real, selfless purpose that are capable of sacrificing themselves for a higher cause, and he'll lose. The film uses the concept of conviction to make this point. A dying Agent Coulson tells Loki he’s going to lose because it’s in his nature. He lacks conviction. In Loki’s first scene, he says that he’s “burdened with glorious purpose,” but Coulson sees through it. He has no real purpose. He’s not fighting for anything that truly matters. He is a child throwing a temper tantrum because he didn’t get his way. He just wants. And what he wants is to show big brother that anything you can do, I can do better. He’s a wimp playing a wolf. No conviction, indeed. To bring the allegory full circle, what are terrorists after? Power through fear. Is that a real purpose? Does that have conviction? Coulson certainly doesn’t think so.
The Avengers, after many squabbles, become that group fighting for a tangible, selfless purpose through the very act of fighting. Obviously, they’re also the ones that defeat Loki and his army. However, more important than the group besting Loki is how they’re able to defeat him. The fights amongst the group when they first come together are hugely important. In a brilliant, excellently constructed scene, where the mind-controlled Hawkeye attacks the Helicarrier, Whedon begins making his case that attacks arise when a society is divided and individuals bicker over their own self-interest. They become blind to the world around them. As the quarrel within the Helicarrier is taking place, the movie cuts back and forth between the fighting on ship and Hawkeye setting up and launching the attack. Cutting between the Avengers arguing and Hawkeye attacking isn't exactly formally inventive, but it is effective. It's simply the correct directorial choice for what the scene is trying to accomplish. It makes the film's point by showing us, again and again, that the "bad guy" is coming as they bicker. It's a visual accentuation of the point.
Eventually, The Avengers are able to set aside their differences and work together as a team to fight Loki. Again, it isn’t just that this happens, but how. Each member of the team, as previously mentioned, has to make those choices to put the good of the cause over their own self-interest, and even safety. Captain America has to decide to go for the red lever to help out Iron Man even though he’s under fire. Thor has to decide to put his issues with Loki aside for the time being to help the team fight off Loki’s army. The Hulk has to decide to embrace "the other guy" and try to tame/control him. Iron Man has to decide he's willing to sacrifice himself and take the nuke into the portal. The movie shows this idea visually with a single, long take during the climactic battle that shows each member of the team working together and helping one another out while fighting the army. Sure, it's really cool moment, but it's more than just showy. It's the movie using it's visuals to show the team coming together, to tell the story. The pairs helping each other in the scene are even the exact pairs that are physically fighting in the Helicarrier earlier. All the pettiness has vanished, and a team has been born. In another symbolic gesture after the final battle, the film shows the “A” in Stark on the massive Stark Tower becoming The Avengers' A. Since Stark makes the biggest change from selfish to selfless in the film (and is ultimately willing to sacrifice his own life for the cause), it's fitting that the movie uses the former symbol of his massive ego to make an emphatic statement that this isn't just a group of individuals anymore.
All of this is right in line with Whedon's worldview as a self-described humanist. If The Avengers stand for society as a whole, we'll be what the individuals within it want it to be. Real power isn't making people fear you and kneel in your honor – it's a group of selfless individuals choosing to fight for a cause. The film uses the concept of sentiment to make this point. Loki sees it as humanity’s weakness, when the reality is it’s our greatest power. Having a reason, a purpose, leads to conviction.
I'm not saying this is the most profound thing in the world, or that the dichotomy between the opposing sides is that complex. Essentially, it’s a standard comic book story about a group of superheroes fighting off the latest evil threat. However, it isn't mindless. Given Whedon’s own track record and the manner in which the film presents itself, both through the writing and the filmmaking, it attempts to tackle a pretty significant subject. Whedon obviously knows the idea of fighting for the “greater good” is old-fashioned, and maybe even a little corny. The film is all the better for being self-aware enough to point this out and poke fun at itself. Again, that’s right in line with Whedon’s typical style, and it’s why his work never feels preachy or pretentious. He can humor an audience and give them characters to care about. His ideas just wash over you, and that’s something only the best writers are able to accomplish.
So, there you have it. That’s my case for The Avengers as a substantial film. Feel free to dispute every point I’ve made or tell me I’m fantastic for making them. The latter option is much preferred, but I’ll take whatever I can get.
Sometimes movies are about their plot, and sometimes they aren’t. That seems simple enough, right? Often, movies are about how they’re about what they’re about (Roger Ebert coined this phrase, not me). That’s just a fancy, concise way of saying that things like camera movements and placements, editing, and story structure are more important than just what happens. There are also things common to the art of writing like allegory and metaphor that allow for more interpretation than just what happens. What’s happening on-screen constitutes the plot, but that plot can stand for something else altogether. A recent example is Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight (2008). The plot concerns Batman and The Joker battling for Gotham City, but, allegorically, the film is about the U.S. involvement in the War on Terror. The best films (and books) are able to marry plot, idea, and technique seamlessly. Ideally, the viewer will be able to appreciate a work of art on the surface level as pure entertainment, but also be able to get something of value out of it with a deeper analysis of both larger significance and technique. I’m not sure Darren Aronofsky’s Requiem for a Dream (2000) can be enjoyed purely as entertainment (unless you’re a masochist), but it’s worth taking a look at to see how to combine film technique and allegory effectively. And no, I won’t be talking about the infamous ass-to-ass scene.
Adapted from Hubert Selby Jr.’s novel of the same name, Requiem for a Dream’s plot deals with the horrors of hardcore drug abuse. It’s a difficult film to watch at times, but that’s by design. Aronofsky’s decision to not shy away from just how far into despair these characters fall is why the film is effective as an anti-drug piece. However, a well done anti-drug movie isn’t exactly the most insightful or ambitious idea ever put on celluloid. Selby is after more than just showing that doing drugs isn’t the most intelligent life choice. His goal is to show the death of the American Dream. The American Dream, as defined in American culture, is the idea that through hard work, prosperity and success in life is attainable, regardless of things such as social class. After all, if “all men are created equal,” logic dictates that actions alone will determine who is successful and who isn’t, right? Selby (along with many, many other authors and artists) calls bullshit on this ideal. The novel (and film), published in 1978, posits that these characters fall into utter desolation and hopelessness from a life spent chasing this unattainable Dream. Lives are spent attempting to achieve an ideal and find happiness that might not ever come. The harder people chase and hold on to that false sense of purpose, the worse off they become. They turn to things like drugs as an escape from reality to cope with being unable to achieve what was promised to them. This allegory gives the title of the work added significance. On a story level, the requiem, which is a mass for the dead, is being played for these characters’ individual dreams, which have been crushed by their choices to live life in a drug addled state. On a broader societal level, the requiem is being played for those who have spent their lives chasing this unattainable ideal.
Now that we’re clear on the allegorical significance of the piece, we can finally get to watching the Money Shot from the film. The four minutes and five seconds you’re about to watch is the ending montage of the film. As we break it down, you’ll see how Aronofsky is able to wrap up the movie’s plot while also visually showing the death of the Dream.
Unfortunately, YouTube seems to have disallowed embedding of any and all videos of this particular film, so I can only provide the following link to the clip. It sucks, I know. Trust me, I wouldn't even post the link if I hadn't spent an entire day writing 2000 words on the clip. For future reference, I'll make sure the clips are embeddable before I begin: http://youtu.be/uuzNohk5cYw
Beginning of clip – 0:30: This first thirty second sequence is taking place inside of Harry Goldfarb’s (Jared Leto) head. It’s a dream and purely metaphorical. The first shot is of Marion Silver (Jennifer Connelly) standing at the end of a pier in a red dress with her back to Harry (the shot is actually an homage to Alex Proyas’ 1998 sci-fi noir, Dark City, which also stars Connelly). It’s an idyllic shot, full of warmth and color. We alternate between shots of Harry running to the end of the pier and of Marion with her back to him. When he finally gets there, she’s gone. Symbolically, Harry’s been chasing an illusion. As Harry realizes this, we see a look of confusion and fear on his face as he begins to retreat. We see a shot of his shoes walking backwards until he’s hanging on the edge of the pier. He falls into what looks like a back alley as he calls for Marion. Again, this symbolizes Harry’s life. The pier might not be a cliff, but it might as well be. Once Harry realized he was chasing an illusion, he falls into the darkness of fear and confusion. It’s poignant that as he’s falling, he calls out for the same ideal, despite his revelation.
0:30 – 1:10: Now that we’re back to reality, it’s important to acknowledge the significance of the juxtaposition of reality and the last moment of Harry’s dream. Harry’s dream ends with him falling into darkness, and then reality has come crashing into Harry’s dream. This sequence is the visualization of reality setting in. The scene consists of a simple shot/reverse shot pattern. A nurse is telling Harry that everything is ok and that Marion will come for him, but Harry realizes that isn’t going to happen. In the dream Harry is chasing Marion in a warm, beautiful place. In reality, he’s lying in a hospital bed with no chance of her coming.
At the 56 second mark, two of the clip’s three main stylistic calling cards kick in. First, Clint Mansell’s brilliantly haunting score, titled Lux Aeterna (which has been used in many other movies, but was written for this one), begins. Second, the camera begins to pull away from Harry in an effort to distance the viewer from the character. This distance is essential, as it’s how the film is able to condemn its characters. Both of these devices will be used over the next few minutes as the montage checks in with each of the film’s four main characters. The devices link the characters together to show the audience that, while these people are in different places and have had different experiences, their plight is the same. As the camera pulls away from Harry, we see his amputated arm as he breaks down and curls into the fetal position (the third stylistic calling card).
1:10 – 2:12: With Harry’s story told, the film shows us brief snippets of each of the other three main characters. We see Marion entering her apartment in a stunningly symbolic shot that begins with her illuminated in the doorway of her completely dark abode. As the door shuts and she turns the light on, we see paper, which will later be revealed as Marion’s fashion sketches, strewn all over the floor and table. She’s gone from the light to the dark, and her dreams, in the form of those sketches, have been trashed. Next, we’re shown Tyrone as just another one of the drug addicted masses in prison. The shot of the inmates walking in a line to their beds makes us feel that there are a lot of Tyrones in the same predicament. Finally, the film gets around to showing us Sara Goldfarb (Ellen Burstyn), but not before we see the shocked and appalled reactions of her friends. To end this sequence, the camera again begins to pull away from the characters in the film, but from Sara’s two friends that visited her in the hospital instead of from Sara herself. In a pretty bold statement, the shot places the friends alongside Sara and the other drug-addicted characters, complicit and equally as foolish in their pursuits. It isn’t just the druggies who are at fault and misguided here - it’s a larger issue.
2:12 – 3:20: The film, again, recycles through Marion, Tyrone, and Sara. This time, as the music swells, each character is framed in the same way and curls into the fetal position as the camera pulls away. Marion is looking at a wad of cash, her ruined sketches still all over her apartment floor. Tyrone is on his prison bed, and we see him thinking about his mother. Sara is in a psych ward and dreams of the game show she hoped to appear on. Along with how the film left Harry in reality, each character’s reality is shown in ruin, the direct result of clinging to the dreams they have been chasing throughout the entire movie (Harry to Marion, Marion to money, Tyrone to his mother’s acceptance and love, and Sara to getting on that game show). The fact that these people are still clinging to those dreams, despite the current state of their lives, is the ultimate condemnation of them and their actions. They’ve so desperately wanted to escape and find happiness that they’ve reduced themselves to…this. All the while, they still cling to those dreams. They haven’t really learned anything at all. They’re just fucked up.
3:20 – end of clip: The clip ends with another dream sequence, this time Sara’s. She looks great – healthy and happy. Amidst the glowing stage lights and cheering audience, we’re told that Sarah has won the grand prize. Her prize? To quote Tappy Tibbons (Christopher McDonald): “Your prize has a sweet smile and his own private business. He just got engaged, and he's planning to get married this summer. Will you please give a juicy welcome to Mrs. Sara Goldfarb's one and only son -- Harry Goldfarb!” Her son as a success. The ideal. Harry comes on stage, and as the two embrace, they tell each other that they love one another. It’s a wonderful moment. It’s a great, loving embrace. However, as Sara’s final look of the film shows, it’s also bitterly sarcastic. In a great bit of facial acting, Burstyn conveys to the viewer that Sara realizes this isn’t reality. At the 3:50 mark she has a look of sheer panic on her face before she suppresses it and goes back to smiling. The audience cheers, and the film fades to black – how Aronofsky ends most of his movies (he’s very invested in how what takes place affects those watching, but that’s another idea for another essay).
The ending of the film is bleak, hopeless, and ultimately punishes the viewer. It says that these people know exactly what they’re doing to themselves; on some level, it’s a conscious choice. They’d rather live in a dream world than in reality. In a larger sense, it’s saying that this is what the American Dream does to people. There’s no sympathy for these people, just a cautionary tale that practically screams at the audience to not be like these people. We see the last act of what are mostly decent people doing unspeakable things in an effort to escape and find happiness. The finality of it all is soul crushing. The film also takes the comment one step further by condemning the “innocent” onlookers. Not only do they stand by and let it happen, but sometimes they’ll even cheer it on. Aronofsky uses his camera to place the same judgments Selby used his pen to place, and that’s why the film adaptation succeeds in keeping the spirit of the book.
As you can see, this isn’t a movie made for entertainment. This isn’t a film I love, but rather respect a great deal. I’m not sure I agree with everything it puts forth, but I can’t really argue that it isn’t incredibly well crafted. Hopefully I’ve done a good job of showing you how.
At their core, movies are a string of images connected together to create meaning. The dialogue, acting, special effects, and music that normally accompany them are simply evolutions of this basic concept. At its inception (mostly out of necessity), film had no sound and existed in this primitive state. As technology developed, the medium began to evolve, but the most powerful films still remain largely visual. It’s this reason why I’m always preaching things like “show, don’t tell” on this blog. The power of the image is what movies are about.
I start with all of this nonsense that you already know because I’ve recently seen 2011’s critical darling and Oscar frontrunner, The Artist. Michel Hazanavicius’ silent film about the transition from silent movies to “talkies” is being praised for harkening back to film’s early days and serving as a way to remind modern audiences just how wonderful and awe-inspiring movies can be. Now, you might think all that sounds silly (and you’d be right – it does), but I urge you to check out some of the reviews of the film. Critics are going ape shit. In an effort to avoid turning this post into a scathing critique of The Artist, I’ll just quickly point out why the film is a fraud and move on to the as-promised-by-the-title discussion of Up.
Silent films are so wonderful because, more than any other kind of film, they rely on visuals to tell the story. Every great silent film is great because of how it presents its images in relation to one another. Hazanavicius’ film doesn’t really do this. The movie seems content to simply have scenes where two people are having a conversation, and then inset a title card to let the audience know what was said. That just isn’t very interesting visually. Given that the movie itself has no ambitions other than to show audiences of today what the silent films of yesterday looked like, this doesn’t really make a lot of sense. The film is nothing more than an attempt at mimicry, and it fails in that regard. Not only does the movie fail at what it’s trying to accomplish, but the goal is ridiculous as a concept. There’s nothing valuable about preserving the past for the sake of preserving the past. There should be a reason aside from just showing the people of today what existed way back when. And then, there’s this: Why do we need a 2011 movie that shows us what the silent movies of the 1910s and 20s were like? A good deal of those movies still exist! Just watch them! If people don’t search them out, then we should accept that tastes have changed along with technology and not force said older technology onto a public that clearly doesn’t care. In other words, stop telling people what they should like. Let them make that decision.
I start with this little (ok, much too long) rant because Pixar’s Up (2009) achieves in a little under five minutes what The Artist took 100 minutes to try and fail at miserably. And with that, here’s the clip:
Hopefully your eyes aren’t too blurry to continue reading. If they are, feel free to pause here and get a Kleenex. If it makes you feel any better, I had to watch the clip 3 times (in addition to all the times I’ve seen the movie itself) before I could even begin writing this. Now that I’ve officially outed myself as a softie in an effort to make you feel better about (possibly) also being a softie, we should probably get to it.
The title of this scene in the film (and the song accompanying it) is Married Life. It’s a fitting title – nice and simple, like the scene itself. However, it’s that simplicity that gives the scene such heft. The film takes easily recognizable images and associates them with common ideas in order to create meaning. For example, when we see a car tire blow out, followed by Carl and Ellie breaking their savings jar, we know they’ve gone into their savings to pay for the repair. By placing those images against one another, the film creates meaning. The scene is able to capture an entire life this way. It’s a concise and affecting sequence and a perfect use of the techniques of silent film, largely due to this juxtaposition of images.
The scene’s practical purpose is two fold: 1) it serves as exposition for the audience, and 2) it invests the audience in Carl’s character and relationship with Ellie. Since the majority of the film follows Carl’s life after his wife’s death, doing both of those things are essential to the film being successful. These goals sound easy enough to attain, but good exposition is few and far between in the movie world. Voiceover narration that plainly and blandly tells the audience everything they need to know is a common tactic. That sucks. As always, show, don’t tell. The reason this particular example succeeds is because it does just that. The fact that it’s basically a short silent film all to itself makes me get all Film Geek Nerdy, but it works within the larger context of the film beautifully, as we’ll see when we break the scene down:
0:16 – 1:23: The sequence begins with a series of small vignettes that depict Carl and Ellie as newlyweds. We start by seeing Carl carry Ellie into their new home (the house they met in, incidentally). It’s a classic fixer-upper. We then see Ellie sawing a piece of wood and Carl hammering nails in a doorway, followed by a shot of the two sliding chairs underneath a window. Since the previous shot showed the condition of their house, we know that the two are making home improvements. Carl then accidentally leaves his handprint on the mailbox, and Ellie does the same to make him feel better as the two share a laugh. This first vignette ends by showing the finished house, which looks exactly like their childhood drawing. Their life together has started, the couple clearly cares for each other, and they’re happy.
The second vignette begins as Ellie runs to the top of the hill, while Carl has to stop and catch his breath. The couple then shares a picnic and watches the clouds shape as Ellie educates Carl on animals and shows off her imagination. This vignette ends with the camera panning from Ellie’s explanation to Carl’s smiling face. This is important because it forces the viewer to see things from Carl’s point of view. The remainder of the film is about Carl dealing with the loss of Ellie, so it’s essential for the audience to see things through his eyes. Once again, these two are enjoying a happy life together.
Next, we’re treated to two short vignettes that show the couple at work and at leisure. First, Carl is the balloon man at the zoo, while Ellie’s outfit and bird tell us she works with the animals. Second, the couple holds hands as they each read a book in the chairs we saw earlier. Again, we know they’re in their house since we previously saw them place those chairs in that exact spot.
At the 1:02 mark, the couple is having another picnic (again, since we’ve previously seen...ok, you get the idea by now). Instead of an animal in the sky, Carl sees a baby. Ellie then sees lots of babies. Carl’s smile is all we need to indicate that the couple is going to try to have a child together.
What this first minute or so of the sequence has accomplished is quite impressive. Each small vignette has a specific purpose (whether it be home, work, family, leisure time, etc.) – they take broad ideas commonly associated with a young marriage and place them together to paint Carl and Ellie’s picture. This linking of separate small scenes is basically how film, as a storytelling device, came to be. It’s more pronounced in silent films because there isn’t a whole lot to focus on other than the visuals, but these sorts of tactics are still the building blocks of all movies. These five short sequences, when shown together, show the audience a healthy, happy new marriage.
1:23 – 1:35: The couple is turning a room into a nursery for the new baby. The camera pans to the right and shows the couple talking to a doctor and Ellie burying her hands in her face. We realize that a baby isn’t coming. The use of color and music are vital in this vignette. The colors in the nursery are bright, vibrant, and, most importantly, lively. The colors in the doctor’s office are dark, drab, and indicative of death. The music throughout the clip has been upbeat and happy. As the couple is working on the nursery, the music begins that same way. But, after only four notes, the tone turns melancholy to mirror what we’re seeing onscreen. Both the use of color and music within this vignette are very simple forms of contrast that both work incredibly well. As a viewer, you just get it, without any real thought on the matter.
1:35 – 2:03: Carl looks at Ellie from a distance (shown again from his POV). He goes to her, gives her the adventure book, and smiles. The couple paints a picture of their house on a cliff, and then we see a coin placed in a jar marked “Paradise Falls”. The two then each cross their heart with a hand raised. We realize that the two still plan to live for each other and follow their dreams. Despite being unable to have a child, their bond is reinforced.
2:03 – 2:43: At this point, the film uses a series of mini-montages to pass time. We see Carl and Ellie filling their savings jar. We see various unexpected things go wrong (a blown out tire, a broken leg, a tree falling onto their house) and the two breaking their savings jar each time. We see Ellie straightening Carl’s tie before work each morning, which then turns into a second mini-montage. After the tie montage, we see the couple again. They are elderly, but they kiss and laugh and still seem just as in love. These series of montages, along with the vignette about losing the baby, serve to show the audience a middle aged couple focusing on their careers and going through the ups and downs of life. The stroke of genius is that through the savings jar and tie montages, the movie has condensed 40 years into 40 seconds without losing any emotion. The use of montage here is also important, as it tells the audience that these ups and downs are essentially what life is.
2:43 – 3:04: Now as an elderly couple, we see that Carl and Ellie aren’t too terribly different. They’re still doing things we’ve previously seen them doing (working, cleaning the house, and having fun together). The film repeats some of the images from earlier in the scene in order to show us the couple is still as happy as they’ve always been.
3:04 – 3:22: This is a pretty brilliant little sequence as Carl picks up a picture of Ellie as a child, looks at the painted picture of their house in Paradise Falls, and looks at the elderly, “real-life” Ellie. Carl’s disappointed reaction and subsequent idea connect the three images. If the couple wants to make good on the dreams of their youth, they should act now before it’s too late. He buys plane tickets, and plans a picnic to surprise Ellie.
3:22 – end of clip: As Carl rushes to the couple’s familiar picnic spot and prepares to spring the surprise on Ellie, the image mirrors a pleasant moment shown earlier where Ellie rushed up the hill and Carl lagged behind. The mood turns melancholy as we see Ellie fall to her knees and Carl rush to her side. The message is clear – no matter how hard Carl tries to recapture the dreams of their youth, it can’t happen. At the 3:30 mark a dissolve to transition into the next scene. Up until this moment, the entire sequence has been a series of individually constructed shots placed next to each other which make up small vignettes. These vignettes have also been placed next to one another to create another, broader layer of meaning. Each shot ended with a cut before showing the next image. Here, when Ellie falls and Carl runs to her, the image bleeds into the first image of the next scene (or dissolves into it, hence the term). Dissolves are used for a variety of reasons, and here it’s used to visually and thematically link the final few images of the montage. The rest of the film is going to deal with Carl’s difficulty moving on with his life without Ellie, and by bleeding these final images into one another, the film begins to show that visually. Carl can’t let go of these memories, so the film, being told from his perspective, doesn’t want to either. It’s an excellent example of film technique used to say something a little more substantial.
After the dissolve, we see Ellie reading a book while lying in a hospital bed as a balloon floats towards her. The balloons throughout the scene are important because they, along with the house, later become a symbol for Carl’s inability to truly let Ellie go as well as a symbol of unfulfilled childhood dreams. The fact that the montage takes the time to set that up by having them in their lives throughout the entire scene is pretty great. This sequence once again uses music to create mood. The music is simple throughout the scene, employing different takes on the same structure in order to convey emotion. Once Ellie gives Carl their adventure book, the couple holds hands as Carl kisses Ellie on her forehead. The image speaks for itself – this is their goodbye.
Another dissolve is used at the 4:00 mark as we see Carl sitting alone with the blue balloon in a funeral home, presumably after Ellie’s funeral. At the 4:07 mark, a final dissolve is used and we see Carl, again with the balloon, walking alone into their home. At 4:20, we fade to black and the scene ends.
In just over four minutes we see comedy, tragedy, and everything in between. Simply put, it’s a life lived. The film uses the power of the image to show this and marries it seamlessly with technique. As far as homages to silent films go, you can’t really find a better example of what makes them so great. You also can’t really find another film today that uses these techniques and this kind of homage for a distinct and real purpose other than to just do it. The sequence wouldn’t be so concise and affecting without the use of these techniques, and it makes the rest of the film that much richer.
