Drama – AFTERFILM

Solaris (1972)

“what is man? a poetic meditation on a sci-fi story”

Solaris 3 I remember how, after watching Andrei Tarkovsky’s Solaris (synopsis; trailer; cast & crew) for the first time (many years ago), it left me (and I left it) with a slight feeling of incomprehension. But I also remember that I enjoyed a lot – and still do, after my most recent viewing of the movie – the “tools” that Tarkovsky uses to create a futuristic (and, at times, fantastic) world. I am referring here to the use of mid-twentieth century environs and objects (brutalist architecture; concrete tunnels and suspended highways; or the cars of the moment, but with added antennae, and with modified sound etc.); to the choice of filming certain “common” materials and surfaces in such a way, that they can “stand in” for environments and places in the movie (e.g. the close filming of various liquids or of smoke, to create the impression of the Okean – the ocean – of Solaris); and to Tarkovsky (and his cinematographer) using practical and in-camera effects to give the impression of different situations or states of being. The research station itself, in fact, is a good example of how to use available and less-expensive props, to construct a futuristic, even a bit alien, environment – and doing that with creativity and charm (even if the “seams” are sometimes visible). Yes, I liked these aspects when I first saw the movie – and I still like them now; but, returning to my initial point, if last time I saw the movie I left with a slight feeling of incomprehension, what is the situation now, after my most recent viewing of the film? Do I understand Solaris, now? Or, more importantly – what kind of “understanding” are we talking about – or should we be talking about, in fact?

Well, the kind of “understanding” with which I prefer to approach the meeting with a piece of art – and that yields the richest fruits, from that meeting – is (as I mentioned elsewhere) not a rationalistic, “puzzle-solving” one. In fact, I am acutely bored by works that offer – or even demand – only that sort of “understanding”. And I think that the very problem with my initial encounter with Solaris, and part of the reason why I left (almost) empty-handed, that time, was that I was inherently looking for a “rational” interpretation and comprehension of the work, being trained to do so, by previous viewings of works from the “sci-fi” genre (and whether or not this movie can even be categorized within that genre is yet another discussion). For my most recent viewing of the film, however, I adopted (with more courage, I would say, but almost unawares, or in a natural way) another approach – which is the one that I prefer, by the way; and I could call this approach “poetic-lyrical”, or one in which I allow the piece of art to have its emotional-existential impact on me, without forcing a rational, puzzle-solving interpretive key on it. And you can read more about the results of this specific encounter in what follows:

Thus, the main “result” of the encounter – the principal imprint that the movie left on me – is the feeling that I had just been engaged in a meditation on what it means to be human; a meditation of a poetic-lyrical, and philosophical, and existential kind – and endeavored using the framework of a sci-fi story. A lyrical-philosophical meditation, then, and not the meditation of an “accountant” – which is what Kris Kelvin, our main protagonist, starts out as being. “Accountant” understood figuratively, of course – because Kelvin is, in fact, a scientist; a psychologist, even; but a kind of scientist (who pursues the kind of science) that might represent one of the sad and barren, blind alleys of modernity. In other words, pursuing not the science of “wonderment”, which is eager to search and to discover the human beings – or beings, in general – as and how and where they are; one that is open to being surprised, even overwhelmed, by what it discovers; and one that “reads” reality with all the capacities of understanding and feeling of the human being; no, but a reductionist kind of science, of algorithms and formulae, of reducing reality to what can be quantified and measured; a “science” that in effects blinds the researcher to the fullness of reality, and which yields no meaningful results – about beings; and an approach that, it turns out, is actually inhuman, and thus not fit to understand human beings – or other beings. And Kris Kelvin’s father, Nik, tells “us” these things, that his son has an “accountant’s” approach, right at the beginning of the movie – but we connect the dots only later, realizing also why there is, seemingly, a deep and entrenched mis-understanding, lack of communication, distance, or gap, between Kris and his father. And later we also realize that right at the beginning of the film we were shown the ways in which the father is so different from his son – see his house, which is a re-construction of an “old” (i.e. twentieth century) house, and which is filled with the artefacts of human culture (books, paintings, busts) – i.e. of humanity. Kris, meanwhile, while living at the same place, is instead consumed by his “dry” work – and he even has to be forced by the father to take a break every day, to go out and to walk through (and to gaze at) nature. Because, as Kris himself tells us (with quite some pride), he “is no poet”; instead, he is “interested in the truth” – but a truth as confined by the limits of his “accountant-like” scientific understanding.

And yet all of this will change, brusquely and radically, once Kris gets to the research station that hovers above the surface of Solaris, this planet that had remained “impenetrable” (in terms of being able to dissect it with the tools of rationalistic science) for the human beings, for so many decades – so much so that they are now considering shutting down the entire research station on Solaris (and/or resorting to the most violent means of “science”). What takes place, then, with Kris Kelvin, on (or, rather, above) Solaris, is a sort of “conversion” – from “accountant”, to full human being. And, interestingly enough, it is in and through the encounter with an alien “thing” – with the Okean (this “thing” that seems to be able to perceive, and then to physically manifest, the content of these human beings’ psyche, or consciousness, or selves) – that Kris, and perhaps the other scientists, will re-learn (or maybe learn for the very first time) how to be human.

I really liked the Okean – this ocean on the surface of Solaris, which appears to be a “being”, or ”thing”, of a raw emotional nature; and whom, in consequence, the humans have been unable to “understand” or to communicate with, using the tools of reductionist science; but who will be “tamed” eventually (and with whom contact will actually be made) when it will be given access, finally, to the very raw “selves” of the human beings (by transmitting to it Kris Kelvin’s electroencephalogram); yes, only then true communication will be achieved between this raw emotional self that seems to be the Okean – and the raw and true human selves of the human beings. Because the Okean had been trying to communicate with the human beings, consistently and from the beginning, but only within the bounds and through the means of its own “natural” possibilities – i.e. by replicating (in physical form, through real embodiments) the content of the inner selves of the researchers (and in the process driving some of them almost mad, or at least puzzling them to no end, given that their reductionist scientific paradigms could not even begin to make sense of these… “hallucinations” that were flesh-and-bones).

Indeed, what happens when a civilization that has apparently lost the capacity of being fully human, and that becomes limited (at least in regards to its decision-making) to rationalistic, quantitative, reductionist thinking – what happens when this civilization, through its “scientific” vanguard, meets a being that is only, and purely, an emotional self – and that therefore can only communicate in those terms, and only with the raw human selves? Well, in the movie this had lead, as said, to decades upon decades of in- or mis-communication, and almost to a final disaster -– until the humans succeeded (almost by chance) in finding a way to connect; that is, until they, the human beings themselves, re-discovered their own selves , which then allowed them to communicate that very self to the raw, emotional self of the Okean.

But, getting back to Kris Kelvin’s “conversion”, or transformation, I would have liked for the emotional violence of the initial shock to be portrayed more visibly, more powerfully – and this remark touches in fact on a certain formalism that characterizes (to a certaibn degree) the acting style employed in many of Tarkovsky’s movies (which I do not find appealing – but which I eventually learned to accept as a stylistic feature, or as a specific idiom, within this cinematic universe). Yet the reason why I would have liked a more “violent” depiction of the initial shock underwent by Kris, is that this shock will be the main catalyst of Kris’ thoroughgoing, deep transformation, which will take place throughout the rest of the movie. I am referring, of course, to the initial, self-shattering shock of seeing his wife (who had been dead for ten years) be materialized next to him – and, as it turns out, out of him (his psyche). His wife, who had committed suicide ten years earlier, because she had realized that Kris could never actually love her, nor give himself fully to her – because his work (his dry, rational work) was his true love, and always came first for him, as a matter of an intentional and conscious choice. But not anymore, but not now – because the festering wound that seems to have lurked at the heart of Kris’ self will now produce, through the mediation of the Okean, a being (Khari, or Hari), who is… his wife, “re-born”; and who will soon become, as Kris says, “worth more to me than science can ever be”. And these feelings will remain even as Kris realizes and knows (leading, initially, to attempts to physically get rid of this Khari) that she is a materialization from and by the Okean; but also that she is, otherwise, and in fact, very real indeed: flesh and blood, and true self, and true emotion – i.e. with the emotional rawness and reality of his (ex-)wife. One can even say that Kris accepts this Khari’s “otherness” (that she is, as a “being”, distinct from his dead wife) and yet that he loves her, nonetheless – and even (perhaps) because of and through that.

And what a lovely and moving “being” is “embodied” by the Okean – a being that, although made by the Okean, and reflecting Kris’ psyche, is autonomous and independent from the Okean, in terms of her self-awareness (even if she can never physically leave Solaris) – and which is also desperately “not” autonomous, and literally unable to live without, or even far away from, Kris (any attempt at physical separation leading to very violent and harmful consequences for her). But she is real, yes – and very real for Kris, as well; perhaps even more real than his previous wife; because the relationship that they develop (Kris and this Khari) is itself real and emotional and powerful and close – and probably more powerful than the “original” relationship ever was. But this Khari, having an autonomous consciousness, will end up (sadly, again) being driven to despair by the realization of the fact that she is not, and can never be, the “original” – and seemingly also by the fact that she simply can not believe that Kris will ever be capable of loving her, truly (!) – given that she is not the “original”. (But I confess that this aspect, of the reasons why this Okean-born-Khari succumbs to despair, is one that I did not fully “understand” – in terms of a full and rational comprehension of the motives.)

But Khari – while ever so lovable and fragile and beautiful (as portrayed by Natalya Bondarchuk) – and while so important for the change that Kris undergoes – is not, however, the central theme of the movie (although she is its central “mechanism”, and where its “heart” beats, or starts beating). The theme of the movie, instead – its core subject – seems to be “the discovery of humankind” – in the ironic context of the fact that they (we) have to go to a different planet, and encounter an alien “being”, in order to discover (again) what it is to be human.

“Being human” – a condition whose artefacts are strewn throughout the movie: from Nik Kelvin’s house, as mentioned; to the “library” on the station, which is also their main meeting place; to conversations between the scientists (with running references to Don Quixote, Tolstoy, Faust, Dostoevsky, and the like); to the classical music that plays on the soundtrack (Bach, of course – and others); to the paintings (e.g. the gregarious Brueghel; or Andrei Rublev’s icon of the Trinity, used in a nice act of cinematic self-reference); to the busts of philosophers and to primitive art; and even to certain artefacts of science itself (e.g. a model of the human body). All these are manifestations of what it means to “be human” in a way so much richer, and broader, and more complex, than what an accountant-like, reductionistic approach, could ever begin to fathom and to understand (and, remember, Kris is supposed to be a … psychologist; that is, a knower of the human psyche – task at which he fails miserably, both as an “accountant”, and as someone who has no real understanding and awareness of the content of his own self).

And here we can recall how Kris dismissed the witness of one of the first people who had engaged with the Okean, Berton – how he brushed away his testimony as “scientifically nonsensical” talk of the “soul” and the like etc. In this sense, Kris’ path to becoming fully human is also a path that leads to the (re)discovery of a broader way of doing “science”, of a broader kind of “understanding” – one driven by wonder, and one that is fully open to being, to reality (instead of shutting itself up to it, in the name of – and by virtue of – its narrow-reductionist instruments).

And his trajectory of transformation will also take Kris Kelvin from being a thwarted, wounded, internally-warped human being – to being healed, to becoming fully human. And perhaps this is the meaning of the last scenes of the movie, as well – scenes that, it turns out, are actually a materialization from the Okean, reflecting presumably Kris’ psyche – and in which Kris Kelvin, who in reality decided to remain indefinitely on the Solaris station, gets to reconcile with his father, at his father’s house (a father who, as said, seems to embody or represent a fuller understanding and existential expression of humanity). And this reconciliation also seems to embody, symbolically and factually, the inner healing of Kris’ self; him becoming fully human.

Having said all this about the “story” of the movie, about what “happens” in it, let me now remark on a realization that struck me quite powerfully, while watching the movie – namely, of what I would call Tarkovsky’s “courage to make high art”; a courage that, to put it quite bluntly, I would be hard pressed to find in any (really, in any) of today’s film directors (well, Sophia Coppola might come to mind, as an exception from that, and regarding certain aspects of her work). I am referring to the fact that Tarkovsky dares to “speak” the language of high art; and to speak about and to make direct reference to high art; and to say important things, about the most essential dimension of the human existence; and to say all this in a strikingly beautiful manner. For example, even daring to ask “what it means to be a human being” – and to use the language and the artefacts of the accumulated human civilization to address this – is a feature hardly encountered either in film, or in art, more generally. Who does this anymore – in a veritable, genuine, truly artistic manner? But perhaps this dearth of real art and real humanity only confirms the core message of the film – about our modern age’s cultural reductionism, and about the subsequent loss of humanity, which follows in its footsteps; because, indeed, we seem to live that kind of impoverished existence, and to feel its consequences in art, in science, and in the types of “understanding” that are deemed acceptable in our times. (And when I refer to Tarkovsky’s “courage to make high art”, this does not mean some empty, pompous, formal, snobbish references to “Western civilization”, or to “Culture”; something like building in “Gothic” style, in the twenty-first century, in an act of meaningless and inauthentic imitation; no, I am referring instead to the courage of asking the essential questions – and of knowing, engaging, and being able to enter into a dialogue with, the answers that the human beings have given to these question throughout their history, throughout civilization; and to being able to speak the language of “human civilization”, naturally, with ease, and at the highest level.)

But experiencing Tarkovsky’s “courage to make high art” can also act encouragingly with regards to our own internal (artistic) cowardice, cowardice into which we might have been cowed as a result of being surrounded, overwhelmed even, by tremendously unambitious, mediocre, low-aiming “artistic” endeavors – and because one is not sure if there is even a public, anymore, who would be interested in hearing, let alone be able to engage with and to understand, such an (high, ambitious, meaningful) artistic language.

Another aspect that struck me about the movie Solaris – an aspect that “lingers” throughout the movie, appearing in flashes and brushstrokes – is “beauty” itself; its presence, in many different forms – its daring and comforting presence. Beauty being – we realize, now – another essential (and unique) manifestation of being human, of a full and true humanity.

A few more remarks – bits and pieces – about particular aspects or moments that have caught my attention; for example, the presence of a horse, which is one of the leitmotifs of Tarkovsky’s movies – and who, for me, represents the artist (as an instinctive, emotional, free, unruly, yet beautiful being; who is naturally what he is, and can only be what it is). (Indeed, an artist is like a bird – and “a bird can but sing”, because that is its nature; as explained in the movie The Lives of Others, by an officer of the secret police, the found out that breaking the “bird’s capacity to “sing” is the most effective and definitive way of breaking its very being.)

As I mentioned above, I also liked the fact that the Okean is portrayed as such a raw, emotional being – and also the fact that the woman, Khari, is also portrayed as an essentially emotional being – and frail, vulnerable, and very lovable, because of that; a kind of portrayal that, again, few would have the courage to pursue, today (but here, again, we are talking about the courage to make art; and what is art if not the expression of truth, as it is, where it is, and how it is?).

Let me conclude with a quote, whose exact spot in the movie I can not recall (but which must be from one of the many conversations between Snaut and Kris) – something about “the mysteries of happiness, death and love” – because it seems to encapsulate quite aptly the richness of a true (artistic, lyrical-poetic, wonder-driven, fully human) understanding of what is a human being.

And let me conclude with a question, as well: namely, whether Andrei Tarkovsky is one of the last exponents of this classical understanding – or, one could say, this understanding cultivated within Western civilization – of what is a human being.

And let me also conclude by attempting to answer my initial question, which started this discussion – namely, whether I “understand” the movie Solaris, now, after my most recent viewing of it. In order to answer this question, I will make a reference to what the movie itself seems to teach us – namely, that the only possible approach to grasping the fully human, is one that is driven by wonder, and that is characterized by an openness to the entirety of the human experience – including its past expressions. And art – according to a long-standing convictions of mine – is the branch of “knowledge” or human expression that is most adept, naturally, to reflecting the fullness of the human experience (while being informed by the other branches of knowledge, in a broad-humanistic vein). In other words, that (although this might sound like a tautology) the only possible approach to art, to poetry – is an artistic, or poetic, approach; meaning that a rationalistic, puzzle-solving approach will be inherently reductionist, and will thus result in an impoverished understanding – or in a mis-understanding – or a complete lack of understanding, and of communication (see Nik and Kris). So perhaps my first reading of the movie was (involuntarily) closer to an accountant’s (I repeat, involuntarily – because of being acculturated, by so many movies within the “genre”, to read them in a certain key, that tries to extract a meaning and a rational conclusion) – while my most recent one was maybe closer to a truly artistic (i.e. poetic, i.e. closer to the fully human) one.

In addition, one should also note that Tarkovsky’s cinematic language is irremediably (and beautifully, and happily so) lyrical (poetic) – which means that his movies can only be truly approached, read, and engaged, in a lyrical (poetic) key. Which is one of the reasons why Tarkovsky is one of my favorite directors in the history of cinema.

A Hidden Life (2019)

“beautiful, but somewhat impersonal”

A hidden life 2 Soon after beginning Terrence Malick’s newest film, A Hidden Life (synopsis; trailer; cast & crew; rating), one is reminded of the style of another film of his, The Thin Red Line; more precisely, in the tone and in the approach to telling the brief story of how Franz met Fani – which is very much like the dream-like remembrances of Jim Caviezel’s soldier in The Thin Red Line, about his desertion and his time among the islanders.

And perhaps it was during the filming of that movie, The Thin Red Line, that Sean Penn got very irritated when, one day, when Terrence Malick was supposed to film one of Penn’s scenes, the director’s attention was attracted instead to a feature of nature (a butterfly? a flower?) – and he turned the camera in that direction, and away from Penn – which, of course, the prosaic, earth-bound and very literal Sean Penn found to be utterly pointless and incomprehensible. I must say that I am on Terrence Malick’s side, on this issue, in general – as Malick’s is a contemplative gaze, to which I can very much relate; however…

However, the tagline that I chose for this discussion, “beautiful, but somewhat impersonal” (which could also have been “beautiful, but somehow unaffecting”), points to what seems for me to be, in this movie, an imbalance between, let’s say, the lyrical and nature-oriented gaze of Malick (to which, again, I can relate) – and the need to tell a compelling human story (which requires the establishment of a human connection between us, spectators, and the characters – and their story).

Because this is, indeed, an important story – not in some objective, abstract, socio-political way, which I would find quite unappealing – but in the sense that it talks, essentially, about the dignity and the sanctity of the individual conscience, and about the noble (yet deeply personal) acts that result from acting according to one’s conscience, while faced with, and over and against, the dirty and cold waves of history. In other words, it is a story that talks about some essential truths of the human condition, through a very personal story – which means that it would have to immerse and to involve us deeply, intimately, personally, with this “hidden” story (and I think that that was Malick’s intent, as well); and yet, in this case the movie remains, ultimately, “somewhat unaffecting”, “somewhat impersonal”. And one wonders why that is so…

Well, in order to attempt some answers, let us get back to that “gaze at (or on) nature”. There is a lot of beauty, in fact a tremendous amount of beauty, in this movie; and a lot of it comes from the astonishing (yet most real) scenery in which the story is set (in the movie, and in the real life) – the scenery of the Austrian Alps. Every mundane moment is thus inundated with this “impersonal” beauty of the natural surroundings – even the daily moments on the farm, which are spent in domestic, everyday activity etc.

However, at the end of the day natural beauty (as beautiful as it is) can only be – and always remains – “impersonal”. And yes, there is something to be said exactly about the juxtaposition of this natural beauty, and the ugly, hard things happening in the world of men, in the same context – and Malick is well aware of this tension. Yes, he seems aware of the fact that nature always remains “neutral”, an un-contributing spectator, a canvas upon which us men can paint – well, anything, good or ill; and of the fact that nature, even in its most stupendously beautiful instantiations, cannot represent a true “escape” from it all, from the human condition. In fact, the entire movie starts with one of the main protagonists relating how they had hoped, initially, to escape the ugliness “of the times”, of history itself, in this remote beauty and in the familial coziness that they had constructed for themselves, on the farm, in their small village – but in the end it turned out that that is impossible. Because the ugliness does not come in fact from “somewhere else”, from some outward “society” – but from the hearts of men, wherever they may be, even in the most beautiful surroundings; and some of the people from the village “community” (which, initially and superficially, seemed so idyllic) will soon reveal the evil (or cowardice, or simply moral mediocrity) that lives in the hearts of men. And – as another quote from the movie puts it – “Nature does not notice the sorrow that has come over the people” – nature does remain, in the end, neutral, impersonal.

Yes, Terrence Malick, the writer-director, is aware of the fact that nature is no beneficent god, either – although, seem to hint Malick, it is the creation of beneficent God – and, in its stupendous beauty, perhaps a prefiguring of how things should be, or of how they will be, when the world will be “made anew”. Thus, at the end of the movie, the wife, Fani, pictures them – her, Franz, and the children – meeting again in an afterlife that is a “world remade”, according to how God seemingly actually wanted it. But! – but here, now – nature remains neutral.

And so, if Malick is aware of all this, what is then the problem (or is there one?) with his “gaze on nature”? And does this problem, if there is one, partially also explain why the movie remains, as I said, ultimately (somehow) “unaffecting”? Without pretending to know better than Malick how he should do his job, I would nonetheless remark on this issue that the entire movie feels as if the story is reflected off the natural surroundings, somehow indirectly – and thus that there is a certain feeling of impersonality about it all. But why? Doesn’t Malick use – which I found quite attractive and instructive – a very low, oblique, close camera angle, when filming the protagonists? – which is brilliant, as it gives the camera (and us) a certain degree of intimacy, by entering, as it were, into the private, individual sphere of character? Isn’t this actually meant to get us close to their personal, “hidden” story? So, why don’t we get thoroughly involved, then; why don’t we become then deeply involved, with each of them, and with their story?

Let’s get back to nature, and to the fact that the story seems to be, as it were, “reflected” off the mountainside. What do I mean by this? Well, I guess that by this I am referring, perhaps, to an over-abundance of natural sights that – and I think that this is the important part – never becomes parts of the story. In other words, that there is a kind of lyricism (even natural lyricism) that “goes along with the story”, that uses the surroundings to tell the selfsame story – and there is also a lyricism that works, seemingly, in disjunction with the story, and that remains thus somewhat cold, apart; and the latter, I think, is what is happening in this movie. (I should perhaps repeat here that I am fully on the side of lyricism, as such – even natural lyricism.)

Yes, this could be one of the contributing factors – or an occasion – for that distance that seems to exist, throughout, between us and this story – and the intimate life of these characters.

Moving on, another reason for that partially “unaffecting” quality might be the fact that there is a kind of a static nature to the story-telling, in this movie – that the narrative feels somehow static. Oh, make no mistake! – the “historical” (contextual) narrative does progress, as indicated by the various time stamps (announcing the given month and year) – and as illustrated, in several instances, by some aptly used historical footage (black-and-white silent reels that are wonderfully used to create a sense of the political and historical context; so well done, in those small capsules, that for me this really represents a model for how to do such things). But the story that remains static is the story of our characters – which is the most important one.

And, again, here I am not referring to their external story – after all, once Franz gets imprisoned, while his family continues its seasonal life on the farm, there is little that would in fact be happening – visibly, externally. But the true story – and the one that Malick actually wants to narrate, I think – is the inner, “hidden” story; and yet, the way the movie’s narrative is shaped and cut, not much – or not enough – is transmitted to us about what happens there, within: in the conscience, where the most important things happen.

Yet in reality – and in Franz Jägerstatter’s case, for sure – things are always happening, there, within; it is never quiet, boringly quiet, in our soul! So the static nature of the narrative, that I am complaining about, refers to the inward story – that it is to that tumultuous inner story of Franz (and of Fani etc.) that we should have been made privy – in order for us to become really, truly, deeply involved – that is, emotionally, personally, existentially involved. But is this inner story absolutely never shown, in its power and intensity? Oh, no, some two-thirds into the movie there is a brief period when suddenly (or so it seemed to me) we become introduced, immersed into the intense and troubled ocean of Franz’s inner, spiritual life; and that period of the narrative is, accordingly, gripping. But then it lets off… Yet this, this sort of drawing of the viewer into the inner life of the protagonist, of actually presenting the ever-changing, tumultuous waves of their (of Franz’s) interior life, should have been the main narrative “hook” (or device) of the movie – which would have kept us involved and, well, “hooked” into the most important and the most dramatic story, of the “hidden life” mentioned in the title. But this inner, hidden life is only partially – only at times – or only indirectly – presented, in the movie.

And yet, I think that Malick’s intent was in fact to draw us in and to present it, this hidden life, continuously and throughout the movie – hence all the monologues, and the personal, contemplative moments; and yet we remain mostly outside of them. Why?

Well, perhaps there is another reason, as well. (And let me say it again – “not that I assume to know better than Terrence Malick what he should do”; in this regard, see also our general disclaimer.) However, another reason or cause for this “somewhat un-engaging” quality of the movie might have to do with the fact that the dialogues (by which I mean an uninterrupted, flowing, back-and-forth, emotional, physical and verbal interchange, of action-and-reaction) are never really allowed to take place, to be present in this movie. Instead, they are cut (edited) in such a way, that what result are fragments, parts of interactions; in which a character utters something – then there’s a cut – then another character utters something – and so on; and what results is almost like aphoristic statements, bypassing each other, or directed at each other, but never becoming a part of an organic interchange, an interchange of which we ourselves can become a part. And this, indeed, is an important problem – that this movie-making technique never really allows us to become truly involved – that is, to project and to immerse ourselves into the interchange between the characters, and thus into emotional situation, and thus into the characters themselves.

A hidden life 1 Because, how does one get to identify oneself with characters and situations – with the story – in a movie? Since we spectators are not actually there and then, we need to do it vicariously – and that happens when we, spectators, allow ourselves to become enmeshed in a given emotional, human situation; when we feel that it is us who are addressed by a character, in a dialogue – and we instinctively react to that, emotionally – and then compare our own reactions to that of the character addressed in the movie. In other words, it is through vicariously lived (“real” – that is, flowing, dynamic) human interactions that we are drawn in, into the given drama. And this is why it seems to me that this strange editing technique, by fragmenting and by making the characters’ interactions impersonal – also leaves us, to a good degree, emotionally outside – and contributes to the general feeling of “impersonality”.

But I guess (and it is just a guess) that Malick might be counting on us to simply, as it were, jump into the given emotional moment; to empathize punctually with specific moments, feelings, states of the characters – but how in the world could we do that? To give an example of what I mean – at various points in the movie, different characters, seen on their own, burst into tears, their face is distorted by suffering (e.g. the mother) – but they’re suffering about what? Of course, intellectually we know what it is all about – but we have not been led, emotionally, into this inner suffering, through the mediation of living relationships. And thus we just watch these scenes – and we remain, as said, somewhat remote, somehow uninvolved.

These might be some of the reasons why – or ways in which – this movie does not become as engaging as it should be – and, I think, as it actually wants to be. And yet the story is supposed to be – and is, essentially, fundamentally – about the most personal, “hidden life”, of the individual; about the inner drama of the soul, of the conscience, opposing the larger, much too large, waves of politics and of history. In other words, A Hidden Life is not only a poignant story about the violent and brutal twentieth century (which had Nazism, fascism, communism) – but talks to the deepest truth of the general human condition – while also being based on a real, true story, of Austrian peasant Franz Jägerstätter.

And Terrence Malick shows us in fact that he understands many aspects of this inner drama; and he demonstrates exquisite existential sensitivity and maturity, when depicting various subtle aspects of this drama. See, for example, his depiction of the barrage of attacks (a relentless avalanche thereof) directed at the moral position taken by Franz, by his conscience (and one is so frail! and so alone!) – attacks that come from literally everywhere: from people official or unknown, to fellow villagers, to the people closest to oneself, and to those who in fact should help guide you in these inner travails. And often these “attacks” are in fact motivated by the best intentions – or so they think (as often they come from sheer human limitations). Think, for example, of one of the most hurtful yet well-intentioned “attacks” – of his mother reminding Franz about how his father, too, died in a war (World War I), and thus how Franz knows what it means to grow up without a father; and that she, the mother, knows also what it means to remain a widow… And how can Franz not be torn to shreds, inwardly, by this – thinking about his own wife, and about their three little daughters, all of whom he adores!

Or, the even more insidious and undermining “attacks”, about which you don’t actually know whether they are in fact “attacks”, or whether it is but reason (finally) speaking sense to you! For example, the inner and outer questions which Franz must answer, like: “is this not your pride?”; “who do you think you are?”; “do you think that your gesture will change anything on a grander scale, in the world?” (“no, but it makes a world of a difference for my soul”); “is refusing to say the oath to Hitler, which are just some words, which nobody believes anyhow, and which you can deny while saying them – is this worth the suffering that you will incur on yourself, on your wife and family, and perhaps on your friends?” – and so on. Or, the worst of all – the inner doubts that one has to face about the very morality or spiritual rightness of what one is thinking or feeling – inner doubts that question the very foundation of the moral position that you are taking, on those very same moral and spiritual grounds… ah, what amount and variety of suffering!

And see Malick’s depiction of the conclusion – or decision, rather – reached by Franz Jägerstätter, a decision reached by many of his fellow-sufferers, who lived in similar prisons under other totalitarian regimes of the twentieth century; namely, that when you find yourself in a situation with no real hope of future escape or release, yet under constant duress and threat directed at your “future” life – that the ultimate solution and escape, which takes out the sting definitively from all their threats at your life and at your future, and that will paradoxically make you free – is to “give up on the idea of surviving at any price”; to admit that you are already, effectively, dead, renouncing all hopes for a future life “outside” – and then, as Franz says, “a new light floods in”. In other words, that the solution is not to give up your life, per se, but to give up on the world, on the hope of escaping and of enjoying life in the future, in the world – which will free you existentially, which will make you completely free (as Franz says, to one of his captors: “But I am free [already]!”) – because thereafter there is nothing that they can do to you, that they can threaten you with, that they can truly take away from you, anymore. Because the only thing that they have, the oppressors – are physical, external, temporal, worldly threats – of taking away your “outside” world, your “outward” future, your “temporal” life. But, if and when you give up on that hope of ever escaping, of getting out, of returning to the world – you can become spiritually (and utterly) free. (And this in fact is also the perennial experience and discipline of the monastic communities. whose members make a conscious and willed choice of renunciation, of “dying to”, the world – in order to become truly free, in their souls – and to belong only to God.)

What a tremendous statement, this, about the superiority of the spirit, of the human self – even against the most brutal dictatorial regimes! And what a great thing that Malick is aware of all this, of all these obstacles and trials – I guess, through readings, meditation, through thinking about the issue – and, I would say, through pure artistic and human sensitivity!

And it is also refreshing to see – and something to be appreciated – that Malick seems to understand genuine, adult faith – and is able to depict it, in its noble simplicity. This is, indeed, quite a rare feat, nowadays (or always?). Indeed, the drama of “the hidden life”, that this movie is about, and that represents the central conflict of this story, is actually a spiritual drama. Thus, being able to understand faith, and the life of the spirit – and the tradition of thinking about these issues, and of the lived experience of faith – represent necessary skills and attributes, if one is to depict such a “hidden” story; and my appreciation goes to Malick, for possessing such intellectual and existential knowledge – and sophistication (or, perhaps, simplicity).

But, speaking of the conflict between the individual and the world, let me open a larger (yet focused) parenthesis, to note something which I do not think is the result of happenstance, of accident. I am referring to Terrence Malick using, in fact almost quoting, idea for idea, from the writings of Søren Kierkegaard. This is perhaps most evident (although there are several, even many such occasions) in the scene in which Franz converses with the artist painting the church ceiling, in which the painter talks about the relationship between art / the artist and the great dramas of existence – and, more specifically, the life of Christ that he is depicting (which is the central drama of human existence, for a believer). For example, during this conversation the icon painter asks himself how do artists dare, in fact, to depict such things – which were real! which have happened in reality! (for example, the sufferings of Christ); in other words, how can an artist approach this real suffering, simply aesthetically, and thus putting a certain distance between himself and the reality and truth of what he depicts – and, moreover, even earning a living, making money, out of doing this? Is there not a deep, and at the end of the day thoroughly disheartening, contradiction, in all this? – on the one hand, the reality of the drama and of the suffering – and, on the other hand, the comfort and the distance of the depicting artist? This is related, as well, to the difference between being an admirer or being an imitator (a “follower”) of Christ – says the painter; between one who looks at what Christ did, admiringly, but remaining uninvolved, remote – and one who starts living out His example. For example – says the painter – the majority of the people in the pews will look at what he just painted (e.g. scenes from the life of Christ) and will see them as, well, things that happened a long time ago, centuries, maybe millennia ago; and this will allow the people in the pews to say to themselves that, surely, they would have never done what those evil people did to Christ, back then, a long time ago! Yet… what do the villagers do in relation to Franz, in their contemporaneity? In other words, both the people in the pews, and the painter himself, are in fact putting an existential distance between themselves and what is depicted, that sacrifice, that moral drama – when, in fact, what they should be doing is to put themselves in the situation, to approach the story as contemporaries of what is depicted – involving themselves personally and intimately, and asking themselves the hard existential and moral questions of – what do I do, what should I do, today? Because, in fact, the moral and existential challenge, and drama, and provocation – the same choice between truth and lie, good and evil, that crucified Christ – is facing me now, today, and everyday! And, when we are watching this dialogue between Franz and the painter, and the movie A Hidden Life, and the moral conflict depicted – aren’t we the people in the pew, and isn’t Malick the painter in the church?

Well, all this conversation, all these musings, are in fact Kierkegaard’s reflections on the topic as developed in one of the essays of the volume, Practice in Christianity (the essay titled “From on High He Will Draw All to Himself”). Of course, the choice of Kierkegaard is very apropos and apt, given the central theme of the movie; as Kierkegaard’s thought and works was dedicated, to a good degree – and especially toward the end of his life – exactly to the conflict between the individual’s conscience, versus the crowd, the outward world, the ephemeral pressures of one’s time. So, a movie dedicated to this conflict – and a movie that wants to point out the utmost importance of the hidden story of the soul, over and against the vagaries of worldly existence – would do very well to be nourished and informed by Kierkegaard’s thought! (And I will mention just one other such Kierkegaardian moment from the movie, also because it is very telling; namely, when Franz asks himself, “does a man have the right to allow himself to be put to death for the truth?” – which is basically the very title – and, of course, the theme – of one of Kierkegaard’s essays from the the cycle titled, Two Ethical-Religious Essays.)

But, you might ask, is Malick’s usage of – his quoting, paraphrasing of – Kierkegaard so important, that it had to be included in this discussion about the movie? Overall, maybe not – but I just found it so delightful and surprising, that I wanted to discuss it, briefly; while, on the other hand, also pointing the interested reader of this discussion to “further readings” on the topic. And let me just conclude this parenthesis by wondering very briefly about how Malick actually arrived to Kierkegaard (a wondering with no evidentiary background, as I prefer not to read interviews with the auteur, before discussing the movie). I wonder in this sense whether Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s writings (the German Protestant theologian whose fate in Nazi Germany was very similar to Franz Jägerstätter’s – and who also meditated and wrote a lot on the topic) might have been a textual source for Malick – and thereafter a conduit to Kierkegaard himself. In any case, let us close this (by now, long) parenthesis – which I enjoyed, but I don’t know about you – here.

A few other details or aspects of the movie, that I find worth mentioning, would include, for example, the superb, sensitive and millimetric performance from August Diehl (as Franz Jägerstatter) – frail, but strong-wired; thin, but like a rock, inside; ascetic but of childlike simplicity; stubborn, but with humility – a wonderful, thoroughly wonderful performance!

I would also point out the excellent choice of using Austrian and German actors – who therefore speak English with an accent – which contributes to making the story both unostentatiously authentic, as well as approachable for the world audience. And, associated with that, the wise choice of leaving some of the contextual or background dialogue in Austrian (German), without adding subtitles; indeed, these words did not need translation, because we understood their gist (the attitude, the context they depicted) – which was a choice that further contributed to our immersion into the given time and place.

I would also remark, with delight. on Malick’s choice of giving significant attention to, and of also presenting the travails and struggles of, Franz’s wife, Fani – in parallel and accompanying, as it were – from a (long) distance – her husband’s own prison sufferings; and illustrating how they both had to carry the burden and the consequences of the choice – just like the choice itself had to be talked out, negotiated, wrangled about, and probably made, together, by the couple. (The movie was thus a delightful picture of marital love, as well.) It is rare when an author understands and presents, with such an attentive eye, and without off-putting ideological biases, the reality, specificity and uniqueness of the woman’s strength, even heroism (instead of either ignoring her part, or of depicting her as a man – both of which miss the specificity). Another movie in which I saw this done very well, in fact even better, was Apocalypto – in which the thrilling adventures of the husband’s (endless) jungle chase are accompanied and paralleled, far away, by the astonishing and gripping drama of the wife’s fight for survival, for defending herself, her children, and a baby who is just being born – all of this happening within the narrow, oppressive, and frightening confines of a hole in the ground; truly striking! But it takes an eye that is both artistically as well as humanly perceptive, and intelligent, to be able to depict this, the woman’s unique drama, and her matching strength – like these two movies do.

And – while much more could still be added, about A Hidden Life – I will only add one more small detail to this discussion, namely the immensely enjoyable and funny moment when Franz responds to the villagers’ salute of “Heil Hitler!”, with a completely unexpected (and thus even more delightful) “Pfui, Hitler!” (phonetically, “Phooey, Hitler!”)! So funny, endearing – and so expressive, in fact, of Franz’s persona – in which both child-like simplicity, and moral courage and maturity, combine, coexist, and are expressed!

To conclude, A Hidden Life is a beautiful, noble and ambitious movie that draws our attention to the inner drama which is, in fact, the real and most important drama of the human existence – a drama depicted through the (real) story of Franz Jägerstätter, a man of conscience and of faith, who anonymously and unexpectedly stood up to the overwhelming pressures of his own times. Given the intent and depth of meaning of this story, it is that more unfortunate that (for a variety of reasons) the movie itself ended up being both beautiful and noble, but also somewhat impersonal, partially unaffecting – ultimately not managing to truly and definitively draw us in, personally and emotionally, into the heart of this inner story.

The Irishman (2019)

“an elegy”

I guess that, for many, Martin Scorsese’s The Irishman (synopsis; trailer; cast & crew; rated R) might pose a bit of a conundrum, as one can find oneself being caught between the need to show an uncritical appreciation for this accomplished director and for the stellar cast – or, at the opposite end, one might actually dare oneself to be critical toward this star-studded film (and in consequence becoming overly-critical). Yet I do not think that any of these positions is necessary; instead, I think that one can enjoy the movie simply on its own merits.

And it is indeed a film that one can enjoy – while, at the same time, thinking about what was, in fact, Scorsese’s ultimate intention with it. At least, that’s what I found myself doing – both these things.

I chose the tagline above (“an elegy”) because the overall sentiment permeating the movie, and reaffirmed by its conclusion, is one of melancholy, sadness (the sadness of sin, which is the other side of the gangster glamour), and of Scorsese saying “good bye” – good-bye to the subject matter, to his favorite actors (De Niro, Pesci, Pacino), and perhaps to a good part of his artistic oeuvre. And even without reading too much into the underlying motivations, sadness, melancholy, and a sort of desolateness (yet not lacking in compassion) remain, indeed, the main sentiments that permeate this film.

Gone are the euphoric and youthful violence of Goodfellas, or the flashiness and glamour of Casino (although in those movies these somewhat appealing aspects were always counterbalanced – especially toward the end of the story – by the ugly, the unfulfilled, the tragic). Yes, they are gone, in the Irishman. Furthermore, while the characters are tridimensional and fully human – and thus worthy even of our compassion – the emphasis does falls, overall, on the desolation of it all (of this whole lifestyle). It’s as if Scorsese would like us to look at everything that happens, at this whole lifestyle and life choice, through the perspective of Frank Sheeran’s (the “Irishman” of the title) daughter, Peggy – whose eyes and presence accompany, silently judging, Frank’s entire trajectory (down to the final judgment expressed by her cutting all relations with him; and when does that happen? after the Hoffa episode, when – perhaps – Franck loses even the last bit of the integrity of his soul). What sets apart this movie, then, in Scorsese’s gangster oeuvre, is that here the “downside” of the life (la cosa nostra – “our thing”) is much more prominent – and the underlying sadness of this lifestyle seems to blend, in a way, with that melancholy with which Scorsese seems to be looking back at his life’s work.

Yet Scorsese still looks at his characters as human beings – full, tridimensional human beings (as he should!). This is facilitated by the actors’ excellent performances, but perhaps by none more than by Joe Pesci’s, who creates such a rounded, complex, fully human character, that it is hard to pinpoint just one thing that would define it (his character, his performance). What do I mean by this? Well, take Pacino, who plays Jimmy Hoffa in the movie; as good a performance as one would want, but also one in which certain notes clearly dominate (perhaps sometimes even a bit shrill?). Or, take De Niro, who plays Frank Sheeran; again, a thorough and “full” performance (as he “fills out” the character), but a resulting profile which could be best characterized through the word “gray”; gray, as in an emotionally- and existentially-stunted person, who is almost a “mute” in his incapacity to truly open toward the other(s) (and even “the Other”). And, in fact, there is no performance in this movie that is not good, within this stellar line-up (in addition to the three mentioned, featuring also Harvey Keitel, Ray Romano, Bobby Cannavale), and supported by great character actors (Jesse Plemons as Hoffa’s adopted son; Stephen Graham as Tony Pro; Sebastian Maniscalco in a deliciously juicy part; the wives played by Welker White / Jo Hoffa and Stephanie Kurtzuba / Irene Sheeran), as well as by tiny bits from other noteworthy artists (comedian Jim Norton as Don Rickles, or Steven Van Zandt stepping in as singer Jerry Vale). And, of course, let us not forget the young Peggy (Frank’s daughter), and her eyes – and in this sense I would like to remark especially the actress playing her, Lucy Gallina. So, only good things to say about this accomplished cast, and about their performances. And yet for me Pesci’s performance stands apart, as being the most inconspicuously rich and complex of them all: no flashy bits, whatsoever; and yet with an inner, pulsating – if sad, – life; combining warmth and menace; blending reserve and affection. The only thing that I would mention about Pesci’s character, Russ Bufalino, is that I would have liked to “feel” (and perhaps also to be shown) a bit more of his colder, violent side (although, yes, we are told that he never did any of those things himself, but had others do them for him).

Much has been made about the extensive use of special effects (CGI) in this movie, which also contributed to its high costs (which is why it could only be made in the context of Netflix’s policy of giving almost blank checks to certain prominent creators), and which also allowed for Scorsese to use his (by now aged) favorite stars, to depict a story that spans several decades. Watching the movie one is therefore aware of this feature, as well; and regarding its success (of this experiment – of de-aging actors in their 70s, to look like people in their 30s etc.), I would say that it had both its well-done (almost seamless), as well as its less-than-happy moments. Yet this is an issue that does not really interest me, at the end of the day; works of art are predicated on a willing suspension of disbelief from those who engage them; what matters, then, is less the individual type, or even the quality, of the effects, but that the same stylistic conventions be kept throughout, making the “universe” that the author creates consistent within itself (even a puppet theater can be deeply immersive, and we quickly forget that they are awkward puppets, if the same wooden figures are used throughout, and if the story is full of life). So, if I have anything to criticize about the use of CGI, it is precisely in relation to the unevenness that I mentioned – because it is that (and not the use of CGI in itself) that can take one out of the story. But all this is, ultimately, unimportant, because overall the experiment worked, and the story – which is what truly matters – worked, as well.

Another aspect that has attracted the attention of many is the length of the movie (about three and a half hours). Did it feel too long? No, I would say that it did not. Was I engrossed in it? Yes, I would say that I was – and that is all that matters. I mentioned in the discussion about Once upon a Time… in Hollywood that it happens sometimes with artists who have reached a certain status in the business, that they become a bit self-indulgent, losing a certain degree of self-discipline, and thus making choices that are detrimental to the artistic act itself. But I did not see that happening here – and not in terms of the length of the movie; because, as said, I was engrossed by it; because the story was rich, and continually moving, continually being told.

As in the other discussions on this website, I would also like to mention here some specific moments or aspects from the film that stood out for me, or that I liked in a special way. One such aspect would be the interesting (although by no means novel) parallel that Scorsese made between the violence of the mobster life, and the general (macro-level) violence of the society at large, through the references made to Sheeran’s experience in the army (in World War II – which is where he learned how to kill, and how to obey orders unquestioningly, for his own survival and self-interest; and thus where he started losing his soul, his connection with God – see the wartime promise that he broke soon thereafter).

Acting-wise, I also enjoyed nice little scenes such as that of Hoffa eating ice cream in the prison, and “conversing” with Tony Provenzano; or Sheeran’s phone call to Hoffa’s wife, Jo, after Hoffa’s “disappearance”.

I mentioned the elegiac, dismal, sad feelings underlying this movie – that is, this mobster life. In this regard, there is a sense of the sic transit gloria mundi, in reference to the trajectories and the demise of (all) the characters. (Demise which, for a number of minor characters, is announced and described at the same moment as we are introduced to them – with a freeze frame, and a brief text describing the manner of their future death.) So, sic transit a this-worldly “glory” that is predicated largely on the logic of power (brute force, violence). Yet eventually all this power fades, naturally. Thus, Frank Sheeran falls in his own house, as his legs simply give out, because of age and ailments. And, when in prison, they all look dismal, all these people who once were the city’s most powerful bosses; and Sheeran’s voice-over tells us that “we were all falling apart there, in the freezing f-ing cold” (an atmosphere aptly conveyed through tones of metallic blue and gray). And the power (violence) that helped these characters control their environments, everything, also had, simultaneously, the most destructive impact on their close relationships (the ones that normally would have been characterized by, and that would have needed mostly, the opposite – tenderness and affection). See here, of course, the relationship between Frank and Peggy (and the other daughters, as well) – and how, at the end, at the end of the day, he is all alone (“Peggy, Peggy, I just want to talk!” – he calls out). Not just alone, but, his power(s) naturally decaying and leaving him, Frank, who once used to “paint houses” (i.e. to dominate others through violence) is now completely and utterly dependent and reliant on others, on other people, on strangers’ mercy. And, by the way, he also finds that, slices of that mercy (from the nurse, from the priest – and, possibly, from God) – as Scorsese’s gaze never ceases to be compassionate.

Finally, in this movie, perhaps more than in any of his previous films of the genre, Scorsese’s characters have (and are) souls – which gives the foundation for and contributes to the overall elegiac tone of the movie. Because, when looking back from the perspective of the soul, what is there that actually remains?… The worldly power and glory? The nurse in the retirement home does not even know who Hoffa once was – let alone recognize the figure from the picture that Frank is showing her.

Following a longer coda (i.e. that part of the movie that follows after Hoffa’s disappearance), the actual ending of the movie is very apt, as well; Frank Sheeran asking the priest not to close the door to his room, but to leave it half-open, because he does not like (want) to remain alone, in the dark. Aloneness, the dark, the cold – attributes of hell, i.e. of the absolute lack of the good: love, warmth, relationships.

Overall, a long movie that reads like a good book, and that, on its own terms, is similarly satisfying.

The Seventh Seal (1957)

“dance macabre”

The Seventh Seal Eng I have seen Ingmar Bergman’s The Seventh Seal (synopsis; trailer; cast & crew: rating), a long time ago, so long that there was little that I remembered from it – before re-watching it very recently – besides a vague feeling of not having enjoyed it thoroughly, of having been somehow dissatisfied by it.

Well, after watching it again, I understand why it left me with those feelings. To put it very briefly (and somewhat vaguely), it has to do mostly with that dance macabre performed at the end of the movie, by most of the characters, under Death’s leadership… But let’s take things in order.

This film is somewhat different from others in Bergman’s body of work, being much richer in action (what happens “externally”) and number (and variety) of characters. I confess that I enjoyed these aspects of the movie (these “differences”) – as well as the fact that it is a kind of a “road movie,” which offers us a kaleidoscopic perspective of (a more-or-less imaginary, or real) Middle Ages. In other words, the movie possesses an “external” dynamism that is not present in some of the other Bergman movies (although all of them are rich in terms of the internal action, of what happens within the characters).

In terms of its “internal” action, then, The Seventh Seal seems to be engaged in the pursuit of some of the same questions that preoccupy Bergman in some of his other movies – and I am thinking here especially of his “God-trilogy”: Through a Glass Darkly, Winter Light, and The Silence (which were made within the seven year period that followed The Seventh Seal). This similarity in terms of the ”inner themes” is not happenstance, of course, as all these are auteur films, written and directed by Bergman himself. So, in a way, what we seem to have here is an enduring Bergmanian conversation or quest – in which we, too, can get involved, as viewers, or as fellow pursuers.

And what is this inquiry, this quest, about? I am not fond of treating works of art as “logical puzzles,” or of getting frantically engaged in looking for the meaning of metaphors, symbols and signifiers. I prefer instead that a work of art reveals what it has to reveal through (the portraying of) human existence itself – just as it happens in real life. (After all, in our “real” life we are not surrounded by walking symbolisms and metaphors.) That being said, when thinking about how to approach this movie, it occurred to me that one of the ways to do that would be by treating the main characters as, more or less, archetypes – in the sense of representing various ways of relating to life (and death), and of situating oneself within existence. Let’s go over these characters (and, presumably, archetypes), then, in order.

The main character – the hero of the story – is the knight Antonius Block. From the beginning we discover that Block is engaged in a struggle with the deepest questions, questions that he can not not ask – is there a God? why does He not answer? what is the aim of existence? – while also struggling with the fear of death (fear that spares none of the characters in the film). In this sense, Block seems to be the alter ego (or at least one of the alter egos) of Ingmar Bergman himself, as these are the very questions that drive this very movie, as well as those from his aforementioned “God trilogy.”

But, if this is one of Bergman’s alter egos, Block’s squire, Jöns, seems to be the other one – or another “side,” “facet,” or “face” of the auteur, of the questioner. (Perhaps, perhaps… needless to say, “perhaps”; as I do not have a definite explanatory key for this movie, nor am I fond of engaging in such quests for riddle-solving… but, let’s continue our exercise). Jöns represents (potentially) the “modern” person; that is, the modern “facet” of our questioner; that is, modernity, which has given up asking (the most important questions), because it has abandoned and reneged on the quest for God. As a result, the perspective that results from Jöns’ existential position is a cold and cynical one, a disabused one, of which the overarching characteristic is an ultimate lack of meaning. However, this does not stop Jöns from showing a degree of humane (humanistic?) compassion (toward the mute woman, or when Jof gets in trouble at the inn), as well as a sense of justice. But the overall impression that he leaves and creates is a disheartening one – and a slightly annoying one, as well, as when he keeps harping on the same dismal statements, and for which he is rightly shushed, at various times, by Block – and by Block’s wife.

But let’s get back to Antonius Block himself, the knight – who is probably the closest in spirit to the auteur / questioner himself, or at least to the question that is at the heart of the movie. Having returned from the crusades, after being gone for ten years – and after having witnessed, together with his squire, (presumably) much cruelty, misery, and meaningless suffering – Antonius is tortured by doubt; or, more accurately, by the conflict between his quest for knowing that God is, and God’s apparent silence in response to this quest.

(And, as mentioned, he doesn’t seem to be able to not ask, to can’t quell the need to know. “Do you never cease asking?” – asks Death (another character in the movie). “No, I never cease.” – replies Block. And why is that? Why can’t Block / Bergman stop asking? Well – says Block – because, “humiliatingly,” he can not “kill God” – or God’s imprint, or the need for God – within himself. And yet, this is a God that seems to remain silent, in the darkness into which Block keeps hurling his questions.)

So why does this God stay silent? In order to answer that, perhaps we have to look at the nature of the question that Block is asking. If we do that, we will see that what Block is actually looking for is not faith, but knowledge. And therein might just lie the problem – which, in many ways, is also (part of) our modern problem (or is it not?).

What do I mean by this? Well, it is known that Bergman was conversant with Søren Kierkegaard’s thought and works; and, indeed, I have seen glimpses of Kierkegaard in the ways in which Bergman approaches certain issues and questions, in other films (or so it seemed). But why is this relevant? Well, not for some “objective” purposes, such as examining whatever “influences” from Kierkegaard on Bergman, and so on. No, such things do not concern me, and should not concern us, really. The reason why Kierkegaard is of interest here is because he was engaged in a very similar quest, as Ingmar Bergman; at the height of modernity, he inquired into (and at) the intersection of faith, reason, and doubt.

If we employ then Kierkegaard’s perspective, and his results, it will become apparent that Block’s problem might be that the actual question that he is asking is not be the right one – inasmuch as what he is asking for is knowledge (certitude), and not faith. What is the difference? Why does this matter? Well, one of the important contributions brought by Kierkegaard to this issue was to clarify the distinction between the rational path of knowing, and faith’s path. Briefly put, for Kierkegaard faith is a specific kind of act or relationship, which begins exactly where reason’s powers end; that starts just beyond the limits of what reason can naturally attain to; in other words, that it is where the powers of reason falter, that faith, a qualitatively different act, comes about. After all, if “faith” and “reason” would have the exact same content, if they would be the exact same act, that there would be no need for different concepts to denote them.

Now, Kierkegaard was Protestant, which colored his approach, to a good degree; and this is why his explanation should (or could) be fleshed out with a bit of Catholic insight, as well – namely, that this distinction between the specific act of faith, and reason, does not mean that faith is an irrational act. No; it simply means that natural reason has its limits, and that a new path of knowledge exists as well that of faith – beyond reason’s natural limits. But why is then faith not irrational – if it goes where reason’s natural powers cannot carry us? Well, an answer to that is that, the universe being rational (intelligible), we also know that God (the Creator) is also rational (intelligible). In fact, this is why even pure, natural, unaided reason can and does take human beings, a good way, toward knowing God! However, there is a moment where reason’s “unaided” powers reach their limits; and this is where, while God remains the same intelligible, rational God, the path continues to be pursued, but through the aid of a qualitatively different act, namely faith. The Catholic tradition of thinking on the issue also adds to this that faith and reason, far from being contradictory, are in fact complementary – as two wings that help each other, and the human being, to know God. But, what does this all mean for the quest of our protagonist, Antonius Block?

Well, the quest in which Block/Bergman seem to be involved (consciously or unconsciously) seem to be that of inquiring about (the possibility of knowing) God within the modern context – a context defined (in many ways) by the fact that all other paths or means of knowledge – besides the empirical tools of Enlightenment rationality – seem to be excluded, to be unacceptable – not even talked about. It is in this exact context that the distinction between the specificity of the act of faith, versus that of the act of reason – as made by one of Bergman’s intellectual “partners of conversation”, Kierkegaard – becomes crucial. In other words, if you ask the wrong question, don’t be surprised if you do not receive the right answer; that a quest for knowledge, for empirical, provable certitude – and not for faith – will easily result in what looks like silence. Thus, if the characters in The Seventh Seal are archetypes representing various ways of relating to existence (that is: life, death, God), it would seem appropriate to add yet another character to this dance, one with whom Bergman was very much acquainted – that of Kierkegaard. And this character would be that of the “knight of faith” – who, by the way, is a crucial figure in Kierkegaard’s oeuvre – see the figure of Abraham in his book, “Fear and Trembling”. Introducing this Kierkegaardian character, then, helps us realize that Antonius Block is not a “knight of faith,” but a knight of doubt – and not of a doubt of faith, but a doubt that results from asking the incorrect question – which leads not to “knowing”, but to “silence”. (As Kierkegaard said – the opposite of existential doubt is not knowledge, but faith.)

Det sjunde inseglet (1957) Filmografinr 1957/03 These being said (and we did just say a lot), let’s continue with our overview of the main characters of the film – and the next one in that review would be the character of Death itself, whose interaction with the knight Block (which begins at the very beginning of the movie) provides the framework and the interlude within which the entire action of the film takes place. (By the way, Block’s game of chess with Death, which starts at the beginning of the movie, and give the context for the movie, might just be a metaphor – for the movie, for the quest, and even for life itself… but, truly, enough with the metaphors!) Well, this “Death” fellow makes for a strange character. Not because it is “Death”; no, but because of the peculiar characteristics exhibited by this “character” in this work of art. For example, Death professes to be “unknowing” itself (!), and thus to not be able to say anything about the “after-life.” Well, normally, if “anyone” or anything should be able to say something about the after-life, that would be Death! So, what does this mean? Well, it seems that in this movie this character of Death is presented – and is seen – quite narrowly; that is, only through the perspective of what Bergman (and us, general humankind) knows for sure about “death”. And, what do we know for sure? well, mostly, we know it as a limit – universal, ineluctable, immutable, coming-for-everyone – but a limit is most or all that everybody knows for certain about Death. And therein lies the problem – that, if this is all that we, spectators, the general public, know about a character, it is not also what the character itself – what Death – would know about itself! In other words, it is strange the character of Death is presented through this, as it were, foreshortened perspective, being limited (as a character!) by our existing knowledge of it; when, in fact, Death should be the very character that would bring us new information – both about itself, and about what follows thereafter. (And this as well serve as the beginning of an explanation for why I was unsatisfied with the movie, and that dance macabre that concluded it.)

I would say that this is some skewed and curiously “flat” character-building – which, I think, fails Bergman, as a creator, and fails the narrative, and fails us, the spectators. Why? Because each and every character that we encounter – just like any living human being that we would encounter in real life – needs to contribute (and naturally contributes) something that we did not know (because we are not them, because we only know them from the outside) to that encounter, to the narrative, and to our understanding (of them, of life, of everything). Such a closed, limited, flat vision of Death, as the one presented (apparently) in The Seventh Seal, has the opposite effect of limiting our understanding; thus this encounter, instead of enriching us, seems to strangely impoverish and limit – us, the movie, the quest. Quite frustrating and underwhelming, for me.

But let’s continue our discussion of the main characters / archetypes.

The next archetype is represented, perhaps, by what the French would call saltimbanques – travelling performers, artists, jesters; more precisely, a family of artists composed of Jof (Joseph), Mia (his wife), and their small boy, Mikael. What do these artists represent? Perhaps – innocence, simplicity; simple and natural life; the simple pleasures and benefits of everyday existence. Tellingly, they are the characters to whom Antonius Block relates the most favorably, in the movie, and in whose company he seems to be in the “sunniest” disposition. As he asks Death for additional time, to do “one more meaningful thing,” it will be this family of artists who will actually benefit from that act – as Block will (apparently) save their lives by detaining and derailing Death’s attention from them. In a way, this family of artists represents a counterpoint to the Block/Jöns duo – who are grim, heavy and laden with the memories and deeds of war (sinful?), versus the members of this family, who seem light, hopeful, and wholesome, and perhaps naturally innocent (and I find that a bit problematic, but more on this later).

Other characters – archetypes – are: the bad clown (or artist, or saltimbanque – who is, somewhat deservedly and appropriately, taken by Death before all the rest); the violent, impulsive, yet somehow likable blacksmith, and his prodigal wife (who has an affair with the “bad” artist); the mute woman (a woman who follows Jöns, after being saved by him from rape – but probably follows him simply out of a lack of alternatives, and basically for safety); and the fallen priest (or seminarian, who seems to have been the instigator of Block’s initial departure on the crusade, but who is now a lost soul, selfishly preying on both the dead and the living, and ‘preaching’ through his actions and demeanor a message of despair and cosmic abandonment); and, finally, Block’s wife, whom we meet only the end, when she welcomes Antonius and his travel companions at the manor, yet whose presence and actions make her a distinct voice in the entire narrative.

These being the main characters, let me also mention some moments from the film that I found interesting, revealing, or telling (for fleshing out the story, the quest, or the characters; or, just interesting). For example, how the mute (lost) woman suddenly speaks (!), but only at the very end, when she sees Death; and her transfigured face even seems to express a sort of happiness, or maybe relief, as if of finally being relieved from a tortured existence; her last words, tellingly, are “It is finished” (hearkening – not sure why – to Christ’s final words on the cross).

Then there is the fact that the ex-priest (who is now a ravenous wolf, and whose life is now a message of egotism, hatred and despair; and who is probably the most negative character in the entire movie) dies of the plague, in great suffering. uncomforted, and left utterly alone – although all of this happens within the eyesight (and in the context of the non-intervention) of teh entire travelling company (Antonius Block, Jöns, the mute woman, the blacksmith and his wife, and the family of artists). It seems therefore that his death matches his cosmically alone and desperate existence; that his abandonment of every other human being, during his lifetime, is matched by how he is abandoned by everyone else, when he dies (“Is there nobody to comfort me?”, he cries; no, there is none.).

There are also several scenes involving a young woman – mentally or spiritually deranged – who is accused of witchcraft or demonic possession (and who also accuses herself of the same); and who is taken to be burned; but whose sufferings are (humanely) shortened by the ingestion of some substance fed to her by Antonius Block.

Somewhere around the middle of the movie there is also a scene in which two “spectacles” are being juxtaposed – one, of the saltimbanques putting on a humorous play of some sort, to informatively entertain the peasants during these times of plague (and the village folk are entertained, to a degree, but overall are only half-attentive) – and the other, of the entrance of a wailing, grim cortege of penitents (who do attract the frightened and impressed attention of all the people). So, what do these two parallel spectacles represent? Two responses to the plague? Or, two types of existential responses to “plague” of death, itself? Or, a commentary on the people’s own ways of dealing with these heavy issues – that they are generally inattentive and scatterbrained, and only receptive to being frightened?

Speaking of the “people”, it is interesting how the “general” public (or at least the wide cross-section of people that is present, eating and drinking, at the inn) is portrayed as being characterized mostly by ignorance and by ill-will. In other words – the “crowd,” the mases, are not “good;” and they do not represent a “solution” (a message with which Kierkegaard would resonate).

But, why the plague? Why does the plague (that is ravaging the country) give the overall context and background for the movie? Could it be that its (threatening, unseen) presence gives Bergman (and the movie) the context and opportunity to ask questions that would otherwise (and usually) be avoided (especially in our modern context)? In fact, the plague – which can take anyone, anytime; which hangs, threateningly, above and around everyone – seems to be similar, in many ways, to death itself (which also hangs, unseen… etc.). And, while the plague might not be around, today, death still is – and yet, the fundamental questions about death (and existence) are no longer posed, in our (and Bergman’s) modernity. The very setting of the story in (Bergman’s vision of) the Middle Ages might serve a similar purpose, as well: to allow him (and us) to ask such questions, questions that in modernity are simply muted (yet which are no less “actual,” important, and universal, as in any other moment of human history).

But perhaps now would be the time – after this overview of characters and situations – to tackle that “unsatisfactory” ending, and why I found the movie, overall, slightly disappointing. Yes, I did find the movie engaging in numerous ways –through the richness of its action and of its characters, as well as through its road movie-like survey of a more-or-less imaginary “Middle Ages”. All that was enjoyable – and I found that satisfactory. The “quest,” however, which drives the movie, was not as satisfactory, in the end – and I mention this because that is not the case with what happens (with the same quest) in his “God-trilogy” of Through a Glass Darkly, Winter Light, and The Silence. And what is the major difference between this movie, and the pones from that trilogy? Well, perhaps it is the fact that in those other movies the principal quest – and thus our questioning – remain open (as it is appropriate, in a work of art)

Can those movies be interpreted in different keys, some that might be similar to the “answer” given by The Seventh Seal. Yes, why not. However, ultimately those three movies do not close the question, but leave it open – by leaving the interpretation of the movie open to us, those who encounter and engage with the work of art. But why do I say that The Seventh Seal does it differently – and wrongly; and what is my problem with that “dance of the dead” (dance macabre) that concludes the movie? Well, it all has to do with that flat or foreshortened perspective on Death that we discussed above. When, at the end of the movie, all (or most) of our main characters are chained in a long, grim and wild dance macabre, being led by Death (with scythe and hourglass in its hands) toward (it seems) the “dark territories” – then Death, who is “unknowing” in this film, has the last word – and that is not right. And the problem is not that Death has the last word – but that this ignorant Death, this flat character that has brought little or nothing to the dialogue, does that. In other words – we start from ignorance, we meet a Death character that is flattened and impoverished by having been designed by Bergman according to said initial ignorance (so why introduce it, then?), and we end with the same. Most unsatisfactory.

Unsatisfactory, because this also closes the meaning and reach of the film, as a work of art. A work of art’s goal and mission is to engage the person who encounters it; art happens at and in this meeting point – that is what art is. No matter the artist’s own interpretation, or position, the true artistic object – once produced – obtains a life and being of its own, imbued with meaning, which comes alive in and through the interaction with each separate, individual person (each of them bringing their own world of understanding, experience, meanings – to this encounter). This is what it means for a work of art to be alive – it is and comes alive, in this encounter; in each encounter, anew, as long as it will exist. But, for this encounter to happen, the engagement needs to be left open, possible, un-closed. (This is why propaganda or ideology results in dead art,) Bergman most certainly did not engage in any such closed-thinking attempts, such as propaganda. However, comparing The Seventh Seal with the God-trilogy, I feel that (no matter Bergman’s own verdict) at the end of each of those other movies I am left still open, free, and thus continuing to engage and converse with the artistic object – long after having seen it. While many aspects of this movie do keep me engaged, hours and days after seeing it, I feel that it is exactly in its main quest (or what I think is its main quest) that it fails to do so – because the movie seems to close the very quest in a flat, unsatisfactory, and disappointing manner. Or so it seems to me.

Because, of course, other interpretations (even of that ending) are also possible (of course!). For example, let’s take the family of traveling artists. One thing that we do know, from the movie, is that they are the most positive characters in it – as said, somewhat in juxtaposition with the disheartened & disillusioned Block/Jöns duo. However, if this is, as it were, Bergman’s positive answer to “the quest” – if this is it, the great answer, as it were – well, then the “answer” is both underwhelming and problematic. Yes, there is something – in fact, quite a lot – quite attractive about the wholesome, simple, (even) naturally innocent picture of this family; on the other hand, if this is the solution, Bergman’s answer, this idealization of “natural life,” of the “natural pleasures of life” – then it is, how shall I put it, quite simplistic, low brow, underwhelming, and unworthy of Bergman’s artistry. Furthermore, if this is what they are meant to represent, then, although this movie was made in 1957, this seems like a foreshadowing of the hippie era of the 60s and 70s; and, let’s be serious, we all know that they were quite far from being the “answer” to anything.

But there is yet another possible interpretation (and, I’m sure, many others). Somewhere at the beginning of the movie, and somewhat passingly, another aspect is introduced – which is not repeated or insisted upon, later. Namely, right at the beginning there is a scene of Jof having a most luminous, light and peaceful vision of the Virgin Mary (as a queen) walking her unclothed baby boy, Jesus (through the grass). And we are told that this is not the only vision that he’s had (of such kind)! So, what does this mean? Does this artist family represent (and contribute thus to the movie) an “open”, luminous possibility – that same open, luminous possibility that seemed to have been closed by the grim dance macabre at the end? Furthermore, the simple and direct way of “seeing” of these people (the artists), might it even be a metaphor for faith (?) – as different from Block’s quest for sure knowledge?

Or, perhaps, are the characters chained to and dancing behind Death, the “sinners” (because, yes, most of them are burdened by concrete sins, that we know of), being taken (as Jof says, when he sees the dance macabre in his vision) toward the dark territory? While, au contraire, are the members of the family of artists… the innocents (in this story)? But then, given that Antonius Block did actually perform a very meaningful (and good!) final deed, saving this family of artists, why is he also in that dark chain of death? Yes, I don’t know…

But, as said, I am definitely not fond of trying to solve “riddles” – so I will let all this here be as it is (was). Was this an enjoyable and engaging, even entertaining movie experience? Yes, it was, in many ways. At the end, however, it turns out that my vague memory proved to have been correct, and that things have not changed – that this movie, as an artistic and existential experience, does still leave me somewhat unsatisfied, slightly disappointed – for the “dance macabre” reasons explained above.

Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood (2019)

“grand cinema – and an ode to classic Hollywood”

Once_Upon_a_Time_in_Hollywood_poster

Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood (synopsis, trailer, cast & crew, rating) is a most pleasurable fare; it might just be my favorite Tarantino movie, or at least ranking at the same level as Pulp Fiction (or Reservoir Dogs), while being quite different from those. But what makes it so appealing?

First of all, its atmosphere. Clearly the intention was to capture and to reproduce a specific time and place: the classic Hollywood of the 1960s (the end of an era, and the transition into a new era – from the TV and films of the 50s and of the 60s, into the culturally very different decades of the 70s – and of the 80s). In the process of reconstructing this world – which Tarantino does, clearly, with care and affection – the movie also reproduces what could be best expressed as “Americana” – or, “Californiana” (for many around the world, the image of California, especially as learned from the movies, is emblematic for what and how the US is supposed to be). It is a sunny, affectionate, but also in many ways blunt reproduction of a world (or of several worlds: of movie and TV production, of working actors, of “civilians” living in Hollywood, of rich people, and of decrepit people). But it all revolves, of course, around the world of film, of movie-making.

That, indeed, is the center of Hollywood (or used to be), so we encounter and see people living at various degrees of closeness or distance from that center: from the up-and-coming starlet (Sharon Tate); to the actor anxiously negotiating the transition of the industry, and of himself, from the 60s into the 70s, who is worried about his future (Rick Dalton); to the crew (stuntman Cliff Booth, who lives “around” Dalton); to the child actress who exhibits an endearing seriousness about the craft, but also an understandable naivety about the working life of an actor; and even to the young girls of the hippy/cult commune of Charles Manson (who live from the crumbs of Hollywood, literally and figuratively, as they take tourists to famous people’s houses, and also pick through garbage containers). In the middle of the narrative, traversing it and giving it direction, are the two parallel stories of Dalton and of Tate (who also “happen” to be neighbors) – which is a good vehicle to showing us the everydays of the actors’ lives – their highs, and their lows; from partying, to doubt and agony about their career or their craft; from being on the way up, to being – or being afraid of being – on the way out etc. One could (and probably should) also add here the Booth storyline – but one can also qualify it as a “satellite” narrative, around and along that of Dalton.

(Speaking of Cliff Booth, and of living on the fringes of Hollywood, it is symbolic how Booth, who is formally Dalton’s stuntman and double, but nowadays works for him as his daily factotum and amigo, and who thus spends his days within the gravitational pull of Rick’s career and life – how he at night goes home to a trailer parked somewhere on a lot behind an open air cinema.)

And this Hollywood – and, in fact, this entire world – is depicted as having two opposite but complementary sides: the glamorous, seductive, fleetingly attractive one, and the dark, dangerous one, of human misery, of evil. This duality characterizes the entire movie – see the apparently fresh young things of the hippy / cult commune (e.g. Pussycat): at first sight alluring and attractive, with the promise of youth and beauty, and quickly turning into something much more dubious, ugly, scary even (the scene of Pussycat climbing unto that car and yelling and gesturing at Booth, after having been so friendly and behaving even childishly toward him, is a perfect expression of that flip of a coin; or see the appallingly dirty, unkept conditions inside Spahn’s home; not to mention the really troubling scenes at the end, when these “freedom-and-lovey” hippies are getting ready to kill.)

(As a side-note, this is the same duality that one sees and perceives in Vegas, or in Atlantic City – one just has to step off the main strip, to see the undergirth, the seamy underbelly, of the glittering surface; all those “occupations” and endeavors that grow like a dark fungus around and under money, fame, appearances.)

But back to our initial question – why did I find this movie attractive, pleasurable? Besides the atmosphere (the Hollywood of the 60s), which is so well captured, the film is also very well (and thus enjoyably) structured. As said, the main thread goes along two (three) parallel narratives, of Dalton (and Booth) and of Tate, and that constitutes, as it were, the middle of the movie; which is preceded by an aesthetic-emotional and informative introduction into the world and the momentary status of each of these characters; and is followed and concluded by a coda about their paths, which itself ends with an egregious (but also egregiously enjoyable) finale.

Speaking of the finale – when I first saw the movie, the ending was definitely not what, or how, I expected it to be. Not having read much about the details of the plot of this movie (I never do), I still knew that it featured or made reference to Sharon Tate (who, as is well known, was brutally murdered – in real life – by Manson’s followers). Knowing that much about the movie, while I was watching it for the first time I kept getting tense and nervous, at various moments throughout the film, when I expected – every moment now! – for something bad to happen, for violence to erupt; in a way, the threat of evil hung above the movie throughout, during the first watching (such a tense, expectant moment in the movie was when Booth visited the hippy/Manson farm). And yet, nothing happens… well, not until the end.

Speaking of the ending, then, I must say that, when I first watched the movie, I found it somewhat disappointing, or underwhelming, simply because I could not make sense of why Tarantino had chosen to deviate from the historical facts. I simply could not understand the reasoning behind the choice (although one could say that it is a metaphor for Tarantino “saving” that classical Hollywood that he lovingly recreates and displays in this movie – but I am not terribly interested in metaphorical explanations.) When watching the movie the second time, however, since I no longer expected that the actual, historically accurate story of Sharon Tate would be depicted (at least in its actual denouement), and since I was thus freed from the ongoing tension of not knowing when evil would break through, and when violence would erupt, I was also able to watch the ending in a more detached state, and to find satisfaction in it. Mind you, even when watching it the first time, I found that concluding festival of violence (oddly) satisfying and rewarding (perhaps also as a much deserved comeuppance for those evil hippy/cult members).

Except, perhaps, for that rather prolonged shot of the carbonized body of the woman in the pool – and not because I was in any way repulsed by that image – by no means; to the contrary, I found that lingering on it actually took away from the “realism,” and thus from the impact, of those scenes of violence. and that it took us out of the moment, at least to a degree. And this takes us to another aspect that I would like to note, regarding this movie – namely, a certain degree (or a streak) of self-indulgence, which I have noticed in other Tarantino films, as well, after the great successes with Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction; and which I also noticed, for example, in Martin Scorsese’s The Irishman, as well (another great movie, by the way). What is all this about? Well, it seems that once the “general verdict” about a director (or about an artist, in general) is that they are a “genius,” or something “extraordinary” – and once, as a result of that, they are put on a sort of pedestal, being given (to a large degree) free rein, and being thus excluded or sheltered from the grind of the daily negotiations with the studio or with the producers, or from having to cope with very tight limits of time and budget – it seems that, once all these happen, what also comes with this is a certain slackening of artistic self-discipline, on the part of said artist.

This can manifest itself in various ways – for example, in this movie I would classify under such a heading the random use of indicative or explanatory text on the screen – random, because it happens in fact only two times: in the scene with Steve McQueen, at the party, and in the one with the car jumping between the two elevated ends of a bridge, while filming that Italian mock-Bond movie. Now, why use these superscripts? Why introduce them, randomly, and only in those two moments? In other words, if the use of such text would be an integral part of the “language” and visual style of this movie (like, for example, the trippy multicolored images interspersed in Punch Drunk Love, or the silent film-like intertitles in The Sensation of Sight), then nobody would mind; but doing something just because one is able to do, even if it comes across as incongruous with the overall tone or style of the movie – well, that I would classify as self-indulgent.

But this is not a new issue, or question, for art and the artists; namely, what is best, for the artist to have complete free rein, or for him to have to deal, and thus to enter into a conversation, with certain limits (which can be limits of style, as in certain “formal rules;” or of means at one’s disposal, or of time etc.). There is the Romantic (uppercase, as in the historical current) notion of the artist soaring unencumbered, as being the best and most desirable state and condition, as he then can attain to the highest realms of aesthetics and of truth. Appealing image, which is also related to another underlying modern idea, that freedom is a value in itself – instead of being only a condition, that gives us the possibility of choice – a choice that can be good, bad, at least imperfect etc. After all, in this very movie aren’t the young hippies of the Manson commune “free,” practicing free living and free loving – and yet their “free choice” turns out to be for deepest, darkest evil?

Without going too far away from our discussion of the movie, one should remember that all (or at least, the overwhelming majority) of Michelangelo Buonarotti’s works were commissions – where he was given a clear task, a certain “surface” or location, and a fairly clear commission – within which he then was able to manifest his soaring creativity and, in fact, genius. But am I arguing for the necessity of outer constraints, of having to fight with obtuse studio executives, and so on? No, never. But I am arguing for the necessity of inner constraints, by which I simply mean an inner artistic discipline, which translates into a certain unity of style, into a coherent artistic language. And sometimes the need to engage a fixed outer framework (necessities and constraints) – be it only in terms of money and of time – helps develop that internal discipline, which results in a more aesthetically balanced and harmonious artistic act. In other words, just because one may use free rhyme (which I actually prefer, or at least I delight in), does not mean that, automatically, his poems will actually have a higher artistic value.

But back to our movie; other instances which I would identify as manifestations of a similar lack of aesthetic self-discipline (i.e. coherence), would be, for example, the overly long scene of Dalton filming a Western; the same thing could have been achieved in a much more concentrated and focused (yet not rushed) manner. Or even the fact that Kurt Russell (who also plays a character in the movie) narrates, here and there, parts of the movie; why Russell? Clearly, it is not the character whom he plays in the movie who actually does the narrating – or is it? So why confuse the planes? And why narrate only at certain (random?) moments, and not more consistently, throughout the film? Again, this – and similar instances – feel like moments of decision which went broadly along the lines of “I can do it, so I’ll do it.” And this is where the studio guy (not that I like them, or want them to meddle – but just as an example) would come in at the end of the day, see the rushes (or check later on the editing process), and ask – why? Or someone, anyone, would ask, why?

Because another problem with artists being put on a pedestal, and receiving, as it were, a sort of a carte blanche, is that the critics as well tend to be possessed by a sort of a feeling of inferiority toward these declared geniuses, so that when they see something that they do not understand, they feel that it is probably their fault (or at least, that it is gauche) that they do not understand, and thus will not question the artist’s choice (and thus would not begin a dialogue that might just help clarify and thus elevate the artist’s own craft). (Not that I am on the “side” of the critics, generally speaking; if anything, you will find me on the side of the artist, most of the time, almost always; but this is a question, as said, of actually helping the artist develop and practice a coherent aesthetics – which is what, I guess, I am half-reproaching, or at least bringing up, when talking about this so-called self-indulgent moments, in the later works of people like Tarantino or Scorsese). But enough of this: I did not bring up these aspects because they would be crucially important aspects of the film – in fact, these are relatively minor, and clearly not decisive, details; I just enjoy such occasions of picking up on issues that can then lead to broader discussions about the condition and the craft of the artist; so this is what this was, a useful divagation – accompanied by a relatively small criticism.

But speaking of criticisms – another aspect that I did not fully understand, nor entirely appreciate – was the way in which scenes from movies and TV shows “of the 60s” (real or imagined) were (re)created and integrated in this movie. First of all, Tarantino used a variety of means for doing that – he either shot a whole scene (or set of scenes) for an imaginary 60s TV show, or he used CGI to replace the original actor with DiCaprio, within real footage from a real ‘60s film. However, the quality (or the style) of these efforts was uneven – compare the less-than-convincing footage with DiCaprio in The Great Escape, replacing Steve McQueen, with that of Leo in the FBI TV show (of course, this might be a conscious choice, as the first one was Dalton imagining himself playing the role in The Great Escape, while the second was a show in which Dalton “actually appeared”). But, more importantly, I would mention here the different “western TV show” scenes filmed by Tarantino, which did not come across as entirely veracious, for me, not because of anything having to do with the set design or other externalities (of course not), but mostly because the actors themselves did not behave (read: act) in that same mannered, formalized, even somehow uncanny way that was characteristic for the acting style of that age, in those movies and TV shows. My point here is not about “mistakes” or “faults” – but about questioning the reasoning behind these choices. In other words, if Tarantino wanted to actually recreate (“with his own hands”) mock-60s westerns – then do it all the way, paying attention to every little detail, and being faithful to a T! And, if you want to insert current actors into old footage – then do it in the same way, whether ultra-realistically, or with some inherent awkwardness – it does not matter, but let the efforts be coherent. Otherwise, I simply do not understand these variations in approach or quality – are they accidental, or are they intended – and, if so, why? I guess that the issue here is not about the actual choice – of doing it this way, or that way; but, again, of using a coherent and unified style and cinematic “language.”

But, although I seem to have spent long paragraphs on these “qualms” – these are, in fact, minor issues, which I see worthy of discussing only (or mostly) because they allow me to raise broader questions of aesthetics and style. Overall, these do not affect in a notable way the overwhelmingly positive qualities of this movie.

And now on to the next issue – let’s talk a bit about the acting in this movie. I must confess that I found Leo DiCaprio’s work in this movie quite excellent, as he created a character – and embodied a person – that was truly different: somewhat rough, and somewhat of a simpleton; anxious, but also arrogant; rich but afraid – it was all good. Margot Robbie as Sharon Tate was exquisitely delightful, as well – a masterclass in showing that you do not need to talk, in order to act – what you need to do is be; yes, most enjoyable. And this takes us to Brad Pitt – who has recently received several accolades (awards) for his work in this movie, but by whose performance I must confess that I was in no way impressed. Not that he did anything wrong – to the contrary, he carried the role very well, did a perfectly fine job; but, for me, nothing that he did was in any remarkable way different or “other” from previous Brad Pitt characters and personae. This is why I emphasized the fact that DiCaprio embodied a character who was markedly different – both from him, and from his previous roles (in my estimation). For me, DiCaprio was the stand-out – and Robbie – in a field of otherwise uniformly superior performances (including that of Brad Pitt). I just don’t see why all the accolades (unless they were conferred for his overall acting career – as it often happens). Finally, it was also good to see Al Pacino doing a very different character himself (a small-ish, but impactful and delightful part); and I also found the presence of, and the scenes with, “Bruce Lee” (played by Mike Moh), funny and refreshing.

Speaking of Bruce Lee, in the tagline to this discussion I mentioned that this film is “an ode to classic Hollywood;” yes, but in a broad sense – that includes movie-making, but also the TV shows of the 50s and the 60s; and the (then) newly-arrived Asian martial arts genre; and the fascinating world of Italian spaghetti westerns (and spaghetti movies in general). All these styles and “worlds” have been, of course, perennial points of reference and personal favorites of Tarantino himself… And this is how and why this film is quite the personal paean to movies – to cinema – to the medium and world of film, itself. An imaginary story about a medium that is, essentially, imagination made visible and real.

I also mentioned earlier that this movie has become one of my favorites – if not my absolute favorite – of Tarantino’s body of work. I am using the word ”favorite” consciously, because it implies a subjective relationship with the movie – which would be accurate, as I find myself “liking’ this movie, in the sense of a personal attraction and enjoyment which is not the same with the somewhat cooler (in both senses) and more intellectual enjoyment of (and admiration for) Pulp Fiction (or Reservoir Dogs). In other words, this movie appeals to my aesthetic and personal leanings, in ways in which the other two do not. And why is that? Well, perhaps because of the actual world it describes – of the classic America of the 60s and 70s; of sunny California – that is, Hollywood etc. It turns out that I might have if not similar, then at least parallel warm feelings towards these times and images (toward this Americana), as Tarantino has. So, the coupé driving down a Hollywood boulevard, on that street lined with classic American neon signs, under a blue or dusky, ink-colored California sky, with palm trees (which, if they’re not seen, are felt) – well, aesthetically and personally, I find all this very appealing.

(We do like movies because we do like to dream. There’s an inherent romanticism – lowercase – in the medium of cinema; even if it depicts the most terrible events.)

Overall, therefore, Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood was a most pleasant experience, and a movie that I thoroughly appreciated, on several levels.

***

Footnoted minutia: for some reason (but I wonder why?) this movie was banned in China (!). Well, discuss among yourselves.

The Silence (1963)

“or, the lack of communication”

The silence film_poster Together with Through a Glass Darkly and Winter Light, The Silence (synopsis, trailer, cast & crew, rating) is part of Ingmar Bergman’s trilogy dealing with (or, rather, inquiring or searching into) issues of faith and of God. Formally, this is relevant information – but we better look at the movie itself.

The first question that emerges is how one should approach (or “read”) this movie. Is it a poetic, lyrical piece – in which case one lets the images and actions on the screen act upon one’s sensitivity, emotions, imagination – or is it a narrative (prose, prosaic) work, in which case one struggles to understand what exactly is happening or has happened, what are they doing and why etc. I found that for me the lyrical-poetic approach works best with this movie.

I should also note that, before watching the film, I read the script that Ingmar Bergman wrote for it (he is the writer and director of this trilogy, so these are the personal works of an auteur). Based on that, I can say that The Silence works better “as” a film, with moving images and sound, rather than as a text. I say this, because that is not necessarily the case with the other two films (and especially Through a Glass Darkly). But this movie’s title is The Silence, and it helps to be able to hear that silence – or, for example, the unintelligible noise that is a stand-in for silence, or for lack of comprehension, or for incommunicability.

Approaching then the movie as a poetic work (which means that one is less interested in what exactly took place, and when, and by whom – than in perceiving aspects and states of existence), the main impression conveyed (and perceived) is that the principal theme of the film is the lack (or even impossibility) of communication, in the broadest sense. This can be conveyed, indeed, by a noisy street, where the white noise of the daily hustle and bustle combines with the strident, cacophonic noise of the cars and of the street vendors. It can also mean actual lack of communication – or impossibility thereof – as between the two sisters (the movie’s three main characters are a younger sister and her child, and an older sister, who travel through a non-descript, foreign country, and stop at a hotel – while one of the sisters is ill, even dying). Incapacity of communication: the entire story takes place in a foreign, even alien country, whose language and habits are different and themselves “foreign”. And also to the same issue of the lack or impossibility of communication pertains the sexual behavior depicted on the screen (from vain attempts at self-love, to casual, purely physical sex. All these are examples or manifestations of said lack of communication with other human beings – and, more deeply, of a breakdown of human relationships.

And this lack of communication – “supported”, as it is. by sentiments of hatred or resentment – seems to be a symptom or manifestation of a deeper problem – of a lack of love and of faith. One of the characters had a fleeting sexual encounter (or so she says) behind the colonnades, in a church; what better image for replacing divine love with an unfruitful attempt at self-satisfaction?

(Speaking of these sexual dimensions, I noticed that for some critics or spectators this is the main, most remarked on, trait of the movie. For myself, I found that these aspects, although more directly depicted than in other movies of that era, are nevertheless filtered through an artistic lens – and, yes, it matters if one is able to take them as metaphors for something else (as I am), or simply as acts or actions. But for more info on this, see the movie’s rating.)

Lack of love, then – of affection, of relationship, of the possibility of relationship… but why? I don’t know – or, rather, Bergman hints at some of life’s obstacles to forming and keeping relationships (which I will discuss in a second) – but mostly, it seems that the underlying cause is the fact that these characters (and possibly Bergman himself, in his mid-twentieth century Sweden or Western Europe) inhabit a world that has been voided of God, faith, love, sense. An emptied world, in that sense – and yet the yearning (which is deepest in the human being) for love, remains and thus destroys (most of) these characters. But let’s not get too far off from the film itself, with our interpretations.

As said, Bergman – or, rather, his characters – hints at some of the obstacles to relationships; some of these have to do with all that accumulation of dirt, hurt, of incomprehensible inner impulses and emotions, of a relationship’s historical memory – all that is, let’s say, visceral and murky… And this takes me to one of the major strengths and points of attraction for me, with regard to Bergman’s films, which is his capacity to depict the cellular-level tissue of existence, of life – those inexpressible and un-conceptualizable strata of ourselves and of our existence that form the mundane soil of our everyday life. “Depict”, I say, because they need to be “depicted,” for example on the screen – because they cannot be “said,” expressed, through words (hence incommunicability). (But poetry is born as the artform specifically suited to express these ineffables of existence.) So these “interstices” of existence are very much present and depicted in Bergman’s films – while, at the same time, they are mostly lacking in the typical Hollywood movies (which is why, perhaps, both characters and actions in these movies tend to come across as unidimensional – because, more often than not, both characters and actions in these moves are sublimated into clear, univocal acts or traits – but that is not truthful, because we, as humans, as not unidimensional, are more complex, and not all is expressible in words; and thus we find that these movies are ultimately unsatisfying, and even feel a bit fake – unless one gets too accustomed to them).

Parenthesis: on the other hand, while this is a strength in Bergman’s movies (or so I find), and in other movies of this kind, there might also be an inherent danger in this exploration of the murky interstices of mundanity. After all, there is such a thing as a “micro infinity” – namely, dissecting physical existence into smaller and smaller sub-atomic dimensions – there is no end to that. Similarly, one could get lost – theoretically – in going deeper and deeper into the murky and confusing interstices of existence; there is that danger, as well. I am not suggesting that Bergman engages in that; I was just pondering on the right authorial strategy: without the complexity of existence, and our confusing and incomprehensible parts, life depicted appears fake; but prudence is needed, as the goal– for me – is realistic depiction of the truth of existence, and not a hubristic attempt at all-comprehension, or a wallowing in the layers of the soil of mundane life.

Another strength of Bergman’s movies (presumably related to the first) is his ability to construct and to depict real human relationships– as they are. This is why his Scenes from a Marriage (the film from 1973) is one of my favorite movies on the theme.

But back to the topic that we were discussing, of the obstacles to communication (and to relationships). Ester, the older (and ill) sister seems to refer to these accumulated obstacles, when she talks about the fact that “you need to watch your step among all the ghosts and memories”; or, talking of “[t]he forces [that] are too strong… the horrible forces”; or even of the off-putting “erections and secretions” (the viscous physicality of existence). Indeed, (helped by their acting) we perceive that in-between the sisters there is an entire past, with so many contradictory events, emotions, hurts, reactions etc., and that it is inexpressible, unclarifiable, unsolvable – and that this past is part of the reason why they can not communicate (or have a functional relationship); other reasons are implied as well. These accumulations of the past might also be responsible for the fluctuating behavior of the two women – for example, in how they relate to other people (Anna, the younger sister, alternates between being overly affectionate, or quite cold and rejective, toward her son, Johan).

We were saying that the movie is, or seems to be, about the lack of communication, and the lack of faith and of love. Let’s add here – as it is related – that in the film there is also a sense of a world that is alien, unknown/unknowable, and frightful; see the “war” themes in the movie (the trains carrying tanks, the warplanes’ flight over the city, the rumbling and then menacing apparition of a tank, on the street, in the night; the soldiers in the café – and so on); the presence of war, in other words, somberly and mutely threatening. Or the theme of the hotel, as explored by the young boy, Johan.

Here I should remark – in connection with what was said beforehand – that Bergman does a swell job in depicting the way in which a child sees or experiences the “wide world” – from the intimidating encounter with sickness or death, or with conflicts between the adults, to the incomprehensible behavior of your parent, to the strangeness of large, impersonal buildings (to be explored, but also threatening), to meeting strange strangers who speak in strange tongues about foreign things – in other words, the way in which for a child sees the things of the world of the adults, and of the world “at large,” as it were. In this movie, the child who experiences these is Johan – and his experiences represent another manifestation or expression of that incommunicability and incomprehension that I see as the central themes of the film. (And I was wondering, while watching Johan and his adventures – is this child Bergman? or is he us – versus the world? Or, even, is this a reference to some actual childhood experiences or memories of the auteur?)

There is a moment in the film when Johan, the boy, “stages” a marionette play (Punch & Judy type) for his ill aunt, Ester. It is the shortest play, because it quickly devolves into Punch “punching” Judy, while shouting incomprehensible things in a made-up language. When asked what this is about, Johan responds that Punch “is scared, so he speaks in a strange language” (and also erupts into violence toward his mate). Quite a clear hint at an interpretive key for the movie. Our existential anxiety – in a world that seems alien and emptied of meaning – also manifests itself as fear and through hurting others – and ourselves. This, of course, if this is in fact the world; but is this our world, my world? In any case, it is the world proposed and depicted by Bergman in this movie; and this might just be him pulling the alarm about, and critiquing, or even diagnosing, Western or Swedish society around the middle of the twentieth century. (But we are getting again pretty far from the film itself.)

The movie ends with Ester, the older one, drawing some conclusions about life and about herself, while she is agonizing in what is probably her deathbed (in her hotel bed). Johan and his mother, Anna, leave to continue their journey toward home, toward Sweden – but not before Ester starts writing, and then gives to Johan to take with him, a sort of embryonic “dictionary” of the language spoken in this foreign country; for example, what are their words for “hand”, “music” etc. She tells Johan – or us, the spectators, I am not sure right now – that he will discover later how important this is; this, what? Well, I assume, a dictionary means to have the words, to understand, to be able to communicate – to have a gateway into existence. Communication, as the entry point into relationships – and thus, to love and meaning (and, why not, faith).

One should also add here that the sole thing that constitutes a point of mutual comprehension and reciprocal communication between these Swedish guests and the locals (in this alien country), is music (either as Bach works played on radio, or as the words “Bach” and “music”, which turn out to be the same in both languages). Music, as an aesthetic alleviator of aloneness, alienation, incommunicability – and lack of meaning.

Yes, one could easily take this movie as a critique (or critical depiction) of a certain society – or of a certain mode of existing. Since a poem is a self-enclosed something, a universe unto itself, self-sufficient, so this movie (and films such as this) can work by depicting “one type” of world, or “one type” of existence (which might not represent the entirety of existence, or of the human possibilities). But a poem is an accentuated, hyper-sensitive depiction of one thing, of one aspect – that faces us with that aspect; in other words, most poems are not encyclopedias, intending to explain all of existence. But, by facing us with the “concentrated” version of one aspect (or type) of existence, it can force us to take it seriously, and thus to make a decision, about and for ourselves, about that specific issue. For example, we can leave this film (or the poem) with the impulse of thinking about how we can best avoid, or avoid falling into, such an empty existence – both as individuals, and as a society. A poem can thus function as a via negativa, revealing something (e.g. need for love or for meaning) by illustrating its absence. And this might be the way in which The Silence becomes part of the Bergmanian trilogy on God (or lack of, or search for God), on faith – and on existence in the 20^th century.

I will conclude by saying that I am afraid that due to this discussion, and to the themes we covered, the movie might come across for you as gloomy and…; while in fact I left this film – as it usually happens with Bergman’s movies – energized and engaged; and I assume that this has to do with the cathartic effect that true artworks have on us (see the Greek tragedies’ effect on their contemporary spectators) – namely, artworks that speak to us by touching on aspects of the truth of reality, of existence; yes, there is something very rewarding and moving when one encounters real communication about real things (even if that thing is “the lack of communication in a God-less, and thus sense- and love-less, world”).

I mentioned at the beginning of this discussion (and I promise that this is its last remark) that my approach to and “reading” of this movie was poetic, lyrical; letting the images and sounds, the humans’ actions, the emotions depicted, enact their effects on my capacities of perception and feeling (just like I would do with a poem or a painting). And I think that that was a good choice, because I dare say that, taken purely prosaically, this movie would not “work” – i.e. if one would approach it very prosaically, as a puzzle to be solved (who does what, when, why, and what is the conclusion). There are too many gaps in information for the movie to work in that sense – and it would soon become frustrating, or unrealistic (un-pragmatic), in that case. And here we arrive at the criticism often raised against so-called art(sy) movies – regarding their incomprehensibility, pretentiousness, remoteness from everyday experience (and the everyday viewer). Well, if a movie is “artsy” and only artsy, (for artsiness’ sake), then I am fully on board with rejecting such snobbish and pretentious nonsense. However, in my reading, this is not that. But does it have moments when there is a slight hint at pretentiousness, at a certain abstracted mannerism? Perhaps, a few; for example, I found Gunnel Lindblom’s writhing in bed, as she was alternating between hysterical crying and manic laughter, pretentious, mannered and unnecessary.

But I am certain (and I am not the only one) that this movie is not intended simply as a pragmatic narrative – it is designed to appeal to our poetic sensibilities; it wants us to feel, to perceive, and thus to understand existentially – or, as I said, poetically. So, I left this movie engaged and replenished with thoughts and feelings about true, real, existential things – thus a rewarding experience. However, I will note that of the three films in the trilogy, Through a Glass Darkly, Winter Light, and The Silence – all of which I appreciate and I have enjoyed – this might be my least favorite (and yet still an engrossing and rewarding experience, and a movie that I would recommend, for those interested in such fare).

1917 (2019)

“beautifully done, but does it work?”

1917 poster

The first thing that catches the eye in 1917 (synopsis, cast & crew, rating, trailer) is the viscerally rendered surroundings – the set design. For example, I don’t think that I have ever seen such realistically looking mud, from so close up. And indeed, the weeks and months spent in freezing, mud- and water-drenched trenches, where one is never dry and always miserable, are a common place of the WWI experience (see the literature of the war poets of WWI).

Then, the next thing that catches the eye is the camera work (cinematography by the great Roger Deakins) – and I am not referring to the much-touted “single, continuing shots,” but to the wonderfully fluid camera movement, that takes the lens along highly improbable and surprising trajectories. One such instant was when it was following the main protagonist (or the one who turned out to be the main protagonist), Schofield, passing the river across the felled bridge – and the camera was floating in parallel with him, hovering, miraculously, fluidly, not too far from the water level – truly a thing of beauty.

However, what starts as a visceral experience, receives a hint of the theatrical, of the artificial, even, later – not in the sense of feeling “fake,” but of feeling “staged” – for us. For example, the ruins of the French town (Écoust) “feel” like they were set up on a stage, or in a studio (which they might have been). On the other hand, on the same set the burning building across that town square gives out just the right impression: you can’t see its features clearly, nor what is beyond it, and you feel lost, because your eyes fail you. (So, even on “staged sets” there are things of beauty.) Also, the way the narrative is constructed feels a bit self-conscious – i.e. with visible intent; I am referring to the way in which moments of “misery” alternate with moments of (intended) “beauty,” or the planned insertion of the “human” (civilian) element (the French woman and the baby), or those soldiers listening in silence to a comrade’s “beautiful” singing – all this feels a bit calculated for effect. And yet, this is based on real stories (as the final credits inform us) told by Sam Mendes’s (the director’s) grandfather – and all that is fine, and all that is to be respected; yet, it sometimes happens that, when you want to tell a story that is important, the weight of its relevance takes over, over its simple humanity – and then it becomes a bit artificial. Of course, I do not know if this is what actually took place – but, as said, at times it feels a bit “designed” for effect; and I was most conscious of it, at times.

The performances are somewhat uneven – although all the players do their job and carry their load well. The choice of a doughy, round-faced boy for one of the two main characters (Dean-Charles Chapman as Lance Corporal Blake) was excellent, as this is what they were, those young soldiers of WWI – farm boys or city lads too young and unprepared for the mechanical carnage of that war. Nonetheless, I was not entirely convinced by Chapman’s performance; especially the death scene was quite underwhelming (although clearly it was meant as a major dramatic point in the film). But perhaps the less than poignant impact of that death has to do with another issue affecting this movie, namely that we should have been more invested, perhaps, in the main characters – by knowing them better, individually, and also in terms of their friendship (relationship). At the end of the movie there is a scene in which Lance Corporal Schofield tells Blake’s brother that his deceased sibling “always told funny stories;” but shouldn’t we have known and discovered this by seeing young Blake doing that, rather than by being told so? In a way, I feel that we the viewers don’t really get to know Corporal Blake, or not well enough – so that we can still receive new information about his character, at the end of the movie. And this is also why his death does not have the impact that Mendes probably intended.

On the other hand, George MacKay (as Corporal Schofield) carries the role and the movie well; his performance is even in the way in which it combines a kind of stoicism and war-weariness, with youthfulness and vulnerability. At the same time, (and this is not his fault), the scene with him climbing over rows of water-filled cadavers, trying to get out of the river, again does not have (what I assume to have been) the intended effect – of disgust, revulsion, maybe even horror, in us, the spectators; somehow it feels just a bit flatter than it should be. And, of course, this moment of “misery” is followed immediately by that “peaceful” moment of “angelic” singing – yes, I do feel a bit manipulated.

But I am afraid that these observations sound all too negative – because this is indeed a beautifully made and very likable movie; and one finds it moving both that it was made, and the intent with which it was made; and, as said, it is a beautifully done piece of cinema. And this is also why I found it a bit frustrating that it fell a bit short of the emotional impact that it actually pursued.

There are some moments with genuine emotional charge – for example, the ending scene, with Schofield looking at pictures of his family, and reading the message from his mother: “Come back to us;” but this moment has been set up earlier, when we learned about his previous (terrible) experiences on the front, and of his reluctance to go home to visit (and why). In other words, the moment with the photos and the message had its desired impact because we have already become involved with Schofield’s personal narrative, at least with regard to this aspect; as said, looking at the overall movie, this emotional investment and engagement does not happen at the level and with the intensity needed, and early enough, so that it could grip and carry us throughout the film, thus allowing for the movie to have its (desired) impact.

But back to the actors’ performances, one should also note some excellent secondary casting choices, with major actors playing smaller – but extremely relevant – parts; and Benedict Cumberbatch, (an unrecognizable) Colin Firth, and Mark Strong all invest their characters with the necessary weight and depth that make those moments of the movie relevant. On the other hand, the character of Lieutenant Leslie (the one who directs them where to cross into no man’s land; played by Andrew Scott), and especially his apparent world-weariness and cynicism, comes across as a bit put on… And this takes me to another thought I had, while looking at the faces of these young actors – especially the extras; namely, to what degree are these contemporary young people able to understand and to portray the depth and the impact of the misery and carnage of the First World War? Aren’t those experiences just so remote from their daily experiences, so as to be almost incomprehensible – and thus untranslatable? What is the role of the director, and what can he do, to immerse them into that state of mind and of being, to facilitate that understanding (beyond what is the task and devotion of each individual actor; but what if they don’t or can’t do it)? Because I was looking at them, and at their faces, and I kept seeing them at a club, or browsing on social media, or being taken by their to tennis classes… There is a tremendous gap between the existential level at which a young person’s life happens today, in the West, in an urban / suburban environment – and even life on a farm. today – let alone the experience of World War I. But perhaps all this is only in my head – or is it? After all, isn’t the task of the actor, always and forever, to immerse themselves into lives (and times) that are not their own – and isn’t it part of the very work of the actor to find the ways for doing so? And that takes us back to the question of the role of the director, in facilitating this, in preparing them – as much as he can – for this. But, yet again, these might just reflect my own prejudices regarding these young actors’ life experiences; who knows?

Overall, then, does the movie work? To address this question, at the end of the film I asked myself what was in fact the point (the goal) of the movie. Clearly, it was to relate some stories of personal import for Sam Mendes, stories that originated from the lived experience of those moments and times. From that point of view, the movie is worthy of respect, appreciation, and empathetic response – and it has them all, from me. Then, the movie probably wants to share this experience (these experiences, of those young men – or heroes – of World War I) with us as well. In the UK World War I has a very special place in the public consciousness and (official) memory – and the movie seems to respond and to talk to that shared understanding of the Great War – somewhat like the red poppies worn in Britain by all the public persons on Remembrance Day. But just like that very public gesture, as respect- and note-worthy as it is (and it is indeed), I wonder if the real, human-level impact and experience of the actual events are not a bit lost, or submerged, under the public nature of the gesture. As said, sometimes the outward “importance” of a thing can overwhelm the real, lived, experienced – human – reality of said thing.

The film also works as a sort of road-movie, taking us through slices of the frontline experience; objectively, it does that well; but, again, are we really “touched” by all that we encounter and see in the movie? So, overall, does it work?

The movie that comes to mind immediately, for comparison’s sake, is Gallipoli; in fact, the moment I learned about 1917 and about its plot, my thoughts went immediately to that movie. So, let’s briefly compare the two – although I am well aware of the fact that they are two distinct and self-standing works, worthy of being judged on their own merits; still, we might learn something from this comparison. Well, given the superficial similarity of the story (and of the setting), what sets Gallipoli apart – not only from 1917, but also as one of the most memorable war movies ever made – is its emotional impact, and the way in which it conveys the inherent absurdity of war. The emotional impact of Gallipoli is clearly due to the fact that it spends a lot of time introducing us to the main characters, that we get to know them well, in all their rambunctious and promise-filled youthfulness – and thus, whatever happens to them, touches us personally. Secondarily, the movie chooses its topic very precisely and intently; it is about an especially absurd and tragic moment, so its goal of revealing the senselessness and tragedy of war is perfectly served by its choice of topic. Thus, the impact is double, in Gallipoli – both emotional (personal) and existential (helping us to understand, by experiencing – and thus to grow); and the movie is also carried by some excellent performances, which help to counterpose the inherent naivety and hopefulness of youth, with the senselessness and the death-filled nature of war. Overall, then, Gallipoli has a true impact on the viewer; for example, although I have not seen it in a long time, I have never forgotten it, and I am ready to watch it again.

Let’s conclude by saying that I am somewhat afraid that these thoughts on 1917 might come across as too negative – when it is in fact a beautiful movie, that deserves (and earns from me) empathetic respect and genuine feelings of appreciation. However, I do think that the questions raised above are worthy of being discussed, first of all because they are the ones that dominated my thoughts, after watching the movie (and thus I wanted to answer them, for myself), and secondarily because I think that they might help us better understand what makes a movie work, and why.

In any case, I am thankful and appreciative for having watched 1917 (directed and written by Sam Mendes, and shot by Roger Deakins).

The Room (2003)

“Tommy Wiseau is a German engineer”

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The Room (synopsis; trailer; cast & crew, rating), written, directed, and starring Tommy Wiseau, is a very popular movie; it has become the standard, in a way, of what a “bad movie” – or, more precisely, of a “so bad that it’s good” movie. It has even been called the worst movie of all times. Is that accurate? Of course not. Out of the hundreds of thousands of films made in over a century of cinema, around the world, this movie is clearly not the worst. Let’s just take into consideration some of the more hilarious productions from the emerging Nollywood “film industry”, or the entertainingly bad action movies coming out nowadays from Uganda, Ghana etc (I mention these examples just because they have become more prominent in the US, recently). Every movie industry has its own lower rungs, and the lowest rungs of filmmaking are probably not even part of an “industry”; The Room, however, does not belong to that lowest rung.

One could even say that The Room is surprisingly solid from a technical point of view; just compare it with Birdemic, or with any of the Neil Breen movies. One of the reasons why this movie is competently made (from a sheer technical, albeit not artistic, point of view), is because it was crafted with the help of a professional crew, and by expending a very considerable amount of money. As described in the very entertaining movie The Disaster Artist, which documents the saga (see our companion discussion of that movie), Wiseau himself financed the movie, spending about 6 million dollars (!) on it. Well, the money he spent is visible in the decent quality of its technical execution. What, then, makes this movie so “bad”, yet also so “entertaining”?

Well, to a large degree, the answer lies with Tommy Wiseau himself, namely with him being both the creative mind behind the film (writer, director, producer), and its main protagonist (actor). Speaking of acting, one could say that the quality of the performances varies somewhat widely; there are quite a few fairly competent ones, including from Wiseau’s friend and project partner, Greg Sestero (“Mark” – nothing special, but competent); or, what I would consider the most grounded and constant performance, from Carolyn Minott (playing the mother in law, “Claudette”). There are however some noticeably poor performances, as well – really noticeable ones! – such as, for example, from the actress who plays the wife (Juliette Danielle as “Lisa”), or some of the famous scenes featuring Mike Holmes (“Mike”). But the standout (in a number of bad and strange ways) is the performance from Tommy Wiseau himself (who plays “Johnny” in the movie).

There is an ongoing mystery, that has never been solved definitively, regarding Wiseau’s ethnic origin (nationality of birth). At the end of the day, this doesn’t matter; in fact, this just adds to the mystique of the movie and of its creator. So why then the introductory statement, that “Tommy Wiseau is German”?

What sets Wiseau apart, as an actor in this movie, and even among the weaker performances, is the curious, awkward nature of his very presence within the movie. Throughout the film, there is a strange detachment exhibited by his character, in rapport with the situations in which he finds himself. Of course, he “acts”, and he “reacts”, very visibly, and sometimes loudly, as well. But, at the same time, we see and feel that the “person” (Wiseau’s personhood, in fact) remains curiously remote, and emotionally detached, in every situation; in other words, while Johnny acts, Wiseau remains uninvolved, absent even. And nothing shows this better than Wiseau’s eyes – whose expression is unchanging, inert, inscrutable, throughout the movie, and throughout the story. The eyes, this essential tool of an actor, the true window into the personality of the character, in this case reveal nothing, as if there is nobody there (or nobody there whom we could solidly grasp and see). Their expression is constant, opaque, even monotonous, while the rest of the face and of the body act and interacts in the scene… it is truly fascinating to watch.

Then, there is the awkwardness of Johnny’s reactions to the various situations, and of how he interacts with other characters – his reactions almost always managing to surprise us, which make him the most fascinating character (and actor) in the movie (!). Yes, he exhibits a strange sort of alienation (“alien” being the key word) from what would be the normal, human ways of interaction and behavior. Watching this is simultaneously mesmerizing (his performance grips and keeps your attention) as well as highly entertaining (because of the incongruity, absurdity that results).

The plot is fairly nonsensical, going this way and that, with dead-ends and unexplainable sideways; but, at the end of the day, the plot is irrelevant. It seems (like others have noted) that the script is essentially biographical, being a splattering unto the pages of a sum of Wiseau’s personal experiences and, even more dangerously, of “deep thoughts” – about life, relationships, the world – while the main character (played of course by Wiseau) is this unimpeachable “good guy”, self-sacrificing, driven only by good intentions… Oh, it’s true drivel, exhibiting all the worst things: it’s in bad taste, puerile, sentimental, self-involved… but it is also highly entertaining, for the exact same reasons. (In these aspects, the script resembles all of Neil Breen’s productions, which exhibit the same things, only increased thousandfold.)

A lot of the details noted above are also deftly touched upon (and explained, or contextualized) in The Disaster Artist, which is why I would recommend watching these two movies back to back, as a double feature – both are highly entertaining, and they complement each other perfectly. This is why The Room fits the “so bad that it is good” category so perfectly – although it is bad, it also really gets a hold of the viewer’s attention, and never lets go; the viewer is constantly fascinated, amused, and also incredulous, at what is going on. Overall, then, the movie is highly entertaining, and comes across as fresh – which is an epithet that few Hollywood movies actually deserve.

But the salient element in this whole affair is Tommy Wiseau himself, who remains an enigma – as an actor, as an auteur, as a person. Who is he? What does he want to say to us? How aware is he, actually, of the ridiculousness of all this? It is his remoteness, the unbridgeable distance that seems to separate us from Wiseau the actor / character / author / person, that made me state at the beginning that, even if one does not actually know for sure his national origin, “Tommy Wiseau is a German Engineer”.

Yes, because the aloofness, the lack of outward emotional expression, the seemingly unpassable distance to the core of the other person – is what one encounters, when meeting Germans – and engineers. They’re strange, those creatures; they relate awkwardly to life; they seem to have a strange misapprehension – or lack of understanding – about how normal, flesh-and-blood human beings act and live; they are strangely robotic… Of course, I mean all this … only half in jest.