Travis' Talk

Antichrist

Oh, Lars.

ANTICHRIST is a film with a lot of fascinating ideas rolling around in its fucked-up head, but none of them really coalesce into something satisfyingly concrete--which is probably von Trier's intention, but unfortunately lends the film an air of "if only...."
The first half is curiously dull, and one finds themselves waiting for the film to spring to life. When it finally does, it never quite manages to attain the level of despairing horror it seems to be going for until the very third act, where She drags He back to their cabin and the film's bleakness finally manages to sink into the viewer's bones. What ultimately redeems Antichrist is its brilliant cinematography, Gainsbourg's performance (although she's not nearly as flawless as some critics would lead you to believe) and, most of all, its ideas.

My interpretations (**SPOILERS**):

--Nature is evil, what with all the endless death and predation and wretchedness, so it could not have been created by God. It was created by Satan. Applying ancient gender stereotypes (even the old "women are clingy and afraid of men leaving them" gets thrown into the mix), the film posits that women are closer to nature (the "Mother" in "Mother Nature"), and therefore inherently evil. Men are just as evil, but like Willem Dafoe's smug asshole of a therapist, they don't realize it, and try to impose reason and order upon Nature, where as a talking auto-cannibalistic fox points out, "chaos reigns!" He thinks he can rationalize away his inherent murderous animalism, but in the end, nature will drag him back down with his female counterparts.

--Sex is evil. In another interview, von Trier has mentioned that he thinks sex is something that holds human beings back from truly being civilized. So, in Antichrist language: She is a woman, woman is nature, nature is barbaric, sex is nature, She wants sex constantly, sex is barbaric. He and She are divided by sex, both the physical act and gender. It is the natural catalyst for their downward spiral. Their child dies while the two are fucking, and She is too far-gone in mid-orgasm to care as she sees her son topple out the window. This is what re-ignites her self-hating madness.

--Charlotte Gainsbourg's character goes progressively more insane researching gynocide, the killing of women by men. She comes to believe that all women are just as evil as they are portrayed in the Bible and other historical texts ("A crying woman is a scheming woman..."). What's more, she fears that gynocide is the natural order of things (He: "I am nature" She: "What do you want, Mr. Nature?" He: "To hurt you as much as I can.") He dismisses this as ridiculous, but as She goes progressively more insane and violent, Nature seemingly guides him toward Her conclusion, and he eventually murders her and burns her body. Nature rewards him with food for following out with its plans. The implication being that gynocide and misogyny are part of nature, and are an inherited Darwinian trait. Which is, unfortunately, true (examine the behaviors of all animal species in existence--the VAST majority are male-dominated, even non-sentient organisms; nature favors the male on top for some reason). von Trier has sneakily, and probably facetiously, encoded a psuedo-feminist subtext here to counter the film's over-the-top misogyny: If Nature is evil and Satanic, then so is misogyny, as it is a big part of nature.

Oh, Lars, you joker!
Does Lars von Trier hate women? I honestly don't know. The constant accusations of misogyny he's accumulated in Phase II of his career (Breaking the Waves and everything since) have always struck me as missing the point. von Trier characters are not people, they are Ideas dressed up in human form. When Emily Watson, Bjork and Nicole Kidman are subjected to horrific treatment in his films, it is not because they are women, it is because their characters represent something. It's no different in his earlier films, where the male protagonists suffer equally horrible, drawn out fates (see the end of Europa). In a recent interview, von Trier stated that he thinks "women are just as bad as men," which, its prankster-ish wording aside, is more than anything a sensibly misanthropic point of view. All his films are profoundly misanthropic--few filmmakers continually show more contempt for our woeful race than von Trier, and god bless him for it.

This still doesn't excuse him from being a MAJOR asshole, though.

Australia

Baz Luhrmann and his muse, Nicole Kidman, re-team for this sweeping, magnificent, absorbing piece of wonderfully shameless entertainment. Luhrmann crams every kitschy by-gone film genre he can into his sprawling three hour run-time: screwball comedy, old fashioned epic, western, war movie and, of course, epic romance. It's a massively silly mess, but its so earnest and uncynical and gosh-darn eager to please that resisting it is only denying yourself its many pleasures. Kidman and Jackman are perhaps the only approximations to glamorous old Hollywood marquee names, and both commit to their roles with a giddy pleasure that carries over to the viewer: Kidman dances through each genre stereotype required by her character flawlessly, and Jackman is a man's-man actor who was born to be sexually objectified by an auteur like Luhrmann--it's easily the sexiest male performance in decades, self-conscious bathing scenes and all. With all its influences and winking homages, Australia cements Baz Luhrmann as the crazy, flamboyant, bisexual Aussie answer to Tarantino. Believe me folks, that's a compliment.

Margot at the Wedding

Noah Baumbach's follow-up to The Squid in the Whale is, on its most basic level, a film about wicked, nasty people being wicked and nasty. Margot (Nicole Kidman, superb), arriving at her New England childhood home by ferry in a chic "I'm not trying to look too fashionable" outfit, then proceeds to self-righteously instruct people how to properly rear their children (while she verbally abuses her own son), takes every chance she can to insult her sister Pauline's fiance, and puts her bizarre "retard"-o-phobia into everyone else ("Have you had him tested for autism?"..."I thought he was retarded, and I began to fear for my life..."). Proving once again how skilled at comedy she can be, Kidman also makes Margot completely loathsome, but at the same time, there is something irresistable about her that makes you (and everyone in the film) unable to walk away from her crusades of passive-aggressive psychological abuse. It's an Oscar-caliber performance, one of Kidman's best, and it's rather unsettling that all the trendy Kidman hatred as of late could have prevented her from being nominated, but Ellen Page could be nominated for ripping off Sarah Silverman for an hour and a half. Even more disgusting is the continued complete dismissal of Jennifer Jason Leigh, who really is fantastic here, and deserved a Best Supporting Actress Oscar nom that she'll probably never get for anything. One of those great actresses who is always, always snubbed, it's infuriating to see Leigh's talents time and time again being ignored. The rest of Margot's cast are all fine: Jack Black does his schtick, which works well (even though I could have done without seeing his ass -- my eyes), and the two young actors who play Claude and his female cousin are fine as well.

As fine as the performances are, Baumbach's script has some minor flaws that annoy from time to time. A certain over-wrought tree metaphor is glaringly obvious (it represents the family!), and while the Deliverance-style neighbors nextdoor are at first used for some funny stabs at the way upper-class people are afraid of the "filthy", uncultured people below them, Baumbach eventually buys into such snobbery by showing that the neighbors are, well, filthy and uncultured by having their shirtless hillbilly son attack Margot's son. Baumbach's obsession with masturbation is also intact; not exactly a con per se, but it's something of note: Margot masturbates on her bed, and later her son informs her that he went into the bathroom and jerked off when everyone was sleeping ("You don't need to tell me that", Kidman deadpans).

The strength of Margot at the Wedding is in its characterizations: the way Margot detonates any moment that is heading toward some kind of emotional truth by either insulting someone or making it all about her ("Did you see me running? That was a lot of running."), or the way Pauline initially comes off as a victim, but Leigh subtly gets across how she and Margot are very much two peas from the same pod.

Margot at the Wedding comes to DVD on Feb 19, 2008.

The Magdalene Sisters

Rarely has a film ever inspired such shameful bloodlust in me. By the end of The Magdalene Sisters, I was craving Dogville-like levels of brutal retribution. I didn't get it, thankfully (or frustratingly), and this is a testiment to the film's adherence to the facts; there was no retribution against the psychotic nuns and sexually abusive priests who made life hell for these poor women. There never will be. As is true today, the Catholic church sweeps any appalling practices under the rug, simply moving some disgusting clergyman to another district, where he will inevitably rape some other little boy. The same applies to the nuns who operated the Magdalene asylums; they will never have to answer for their crimes.

This enraging fact is what drove actor-turned-director Peter Mullan to make the film. Opening with a stunning, mostly wordles 8 minute opening sequence, we are introduced to Margaret (Annie-Marie Duff), who is traumatically raped by her cousin at a wedding ceremony, and is then condemned for telling someone. Bernadette (Nora-Jane Noone, who would later go on to get torn apart by blind mutants in the also-brilliant The Descent) is sent to the asylum simply because she is too pretty, and Rose (Dorothy Duffy) is abandoned by her family when she gives birth out of wedlock. Once there, they meet the other "fallen women", including Crispina (heartbreakingly played by Eileen Walsh), a mentally challenged young woman who also had a child out of wedlock. It's impossible not to love these four characters (although Bernadette becomes increasingly cruel), and their likability only makes the vicious attacks on them by the nuns more horrifying. How ironic that this little drama more accurately and hauntingly portrays the horror of brutal, totalitarian authority than another film I recently viewed: the lame, pompously stupid V for Vendetta. As Sister Bridgette (essentially an even more evil Nurse Ratched in a nun get-up), Geraldine McEwan radiates a kinf od glacial hatred that is fascinating to watch. The other nuns are less developed, but project a palpable sense of condescending menace toward the young girls they abuse.

While all the acting is first-rate, the filmmaking more than holds its own. Mullan's script and direction are both remarkably assured, and one wonders why he doesn't quit acting altogether and become a full-time filmmaker. Based on this film alone (I have not seen his debut), he has the makings of a first-rate auteur. For such dark, girtty subject matter, the film is also astonishingly beautiful to look at --every image is meticulously composed, and the entire film itself has a muted, grainy seventies vibe that works wonderfully.
Perhaps most magnificently of all is the way the film affects the viewer; one feels a sense of emotion that steadily rises until it reaches a breaking point with the film's final, tragic shot. I managed not to shed a tear for the entire runtime -- until the last image, showing poor Crispina's fate. And then all the anger and grief that the film had built up within me exploded, and I burst into tears.

Punishment Park

Quite possibly the most disturbing and realistic faux-documentary ever made, Punishment Park immediately establishes itself within the first 10 minutes as a chilling work of genius; the whole film, right from the start, feels so horrifyingly real, helped considerably by the fact that all the left wing radicals in the film are played by actual left wing radicals, and the oppressive cops and right wingers are all played by people not too far off from their characters.

Switching between a group of "subversives" being subjected to the death race of the title, and another group being grilled at a tribunal by a bunch of right wing scumbags, the film is brilliantly edited, impeccably acted by the "cast", and feels terribly, disturbingly relevant today. It does feel dated in many ways by the cultural landscape of the time - references to Vietnam, the draft, and Kent State abound - but it doesn't take much imagination to substitute more modern developments, and you immediately have a scary picture of some aspects of our current political culture. The tribunal scenes, where dim old patrio-fascists - all white men, except for a woman who is a representative of a Focus on the Family-type organization and is described as a "homemaker" - condemn hippies to death or prison for threatening to instigate change in the government via revolution, are both despairingly realistic and darkly funny. The accused spout slogans and do their best to argue against their oppressors, who either shout them down or have them gagged. Meanwhile, out in the punishment park, the cops and National Guardsmen who are being "trained" on the course show themselves to be self-righteous good ol' boys who like the power a rifle gives them, and then try and justify their governmentally-sanctioned sadism by saying "we're just doing what the taxpayers pay us to do".

Documenting all of this is a British camera crew, the narrator of which is played by the director himself. As the prisoners in the park try to reach the flag without being killed by the 'pigs', and the prisoners at the tribunal rail in vain against the establishment (the 'homemaker', humorously, accuses every prisoner on trial of being 'immoral' and a 'threat to my children!'), the film becomes increasingly grim and brutal, and director Peter Watkins' editing brilliantly undercuts the characters' dialogue with contradictory news reports, or quickly cuts to and away from a character saying something that reveals their monstrosity or ignorance. So stunning is his work here, that I am now inspired to hunt down everything in his filmography. The hand-held cinematography is accomplished, and the score is a simple, menacing suite of atonal, reverberating metallic percussion. Punishment Park is a difficult film to analyze, due to its striking complexity and chilling realism, and it can make for difficult viewing - but it is a brilliantly made, captivating film that is perhaps even more chilling today than it was over thirty years ago.

Far From Heaven

I don't really know what to make of Todd Haynes. A director with no discernable style of his own, he crafts all his films as homages to the filmmaking styles of other directors (Safe, this film), or he makes bio pics of rock stars from the 60's and 70's, and then tries recreating those eras (Superstar, Velvet Goldmine, I'm Not There). If he were just a derivative hack, it would be easy to dismiss his work, but with this film, he washes away the bad taste left in my mouth after I viewed his Velvet Goldmine.

Far From Heaven has something his previous film did not: actual characters we care about, portrayed by actors with the ability to actually get across feeling. Julianne Moore's performance here is easily one of the best - by any thespian, male or female - that has ever graced the screen. Essentially given a duel role (she must become the character of Cathy Whitaker, but she must also adopt the acting style dominant in the time period that the film tries to recreate), she pulls it all off so immaculately that her character haunts you long after the retro-syled end title cards have rolled. Dennis Haysbert is almost her equal, radiating warmth, intelligence and sincerity. When the two share screen time, their scenes together have a touching beauty - early in the film, Moore runs into Haysbert at an art show, and the two of them have a sweet discussion about one of the paintings in front of them. It's a pitch perfect scene, seemingly minor considering the charged drama to come, but its simple beauty leaves a deep impression. In comparison with the previously mentioned pair, Dennis Quaid doesn't fare as well. His performance is perfectly adequate, but it can't compete with Haysbert's, let alone even approach Moore's.

From a technical perspecive, Far From Heaven is nearly flawless: its period detail is superb, the score by Elmer Bernstein is beautiful and appropriately melodramatic, and the cinematography is lovely. Hayne's direction does well at recapturing Sirk's style, but is not quite perfect in one respect: the film stock. One would assume that, given the efforts in every other respect to recreate the look, sound, and feel of a '50s melodrama, Haynes would opt to make the film look its attempted age. It's not a major flaw, but it is mildly distracting nonetheless, especially considering the big, flowery font of the titles. This minor critique is emblematic of the entire film itself; it is near-perfect, but something just feels missing. I place the blame on the style the film emulates; it gets it near-perfect, right down to the flaws that rob the film of the immense emotional power it could have had without all the stylistic, melodramatic posturing. That isn't to say the film isn't powerful - it most certainly is, and even moved me to tears on occasion - just that it could have been even moreso.
Still, Haynes' script is a masterpiece, and enough of its brilliance shines through, and when combined with Moore's phenomenal turn, makes Far From Heaven essential viewing.

The Golden Compass

****THIS REVIEW CONTAINS MAJOR SPOILERS****

As of the re-writing of this review, I have seen the film twice (both times in its opening weekend). The film failed miserably at the US box office, but when you take into account widespread campaigns of creepy misinformation like THIS, its failure doesn't seem all that surprising. Just more proof that the United States is a stunningly backwards country that is slowly retrogressing in time socially, while the rest of the world moves forward. As of this writing, the film has grossed $232 million outside the US, and is still doing very well in the UK and every other international market. As Roger Ebert said in his 4 star review of the film, "The books have been attacked by American Christians over questions of religion; their popularity in the U.K. may represent more confident believers whose response to other beliefs is to respond, rather than suppress."

The Golden Compass was, personally, the most anticipated film of my life. I first read the novel when I was twelve, and as I started to grow into the person I am today, it had a profound effect on me. It is hard for me to describe the books importance in shaping who I am today; growing up in the South, I lived in a deeply religious community, and though I was dragged to church every Sunday (and sometimes Wednesday), those fire and brimstone sermons just never took to me. I was extremely suspicious of all this Biblical stuff - after all, religion was supposed to make people "better", but so many of the deeply religious people I knew were hypocrites, bullies, and personality-less bores. Being a child, these critical thoughts never really came together in my mind to produce an "a-ha!" moment, and I only had a vague suspicion that all the people I knew were probably wrong. One day, as I was browsing my school library, I found a book with an interesting cover; it had a little girl riding on the back of a polar bear. "Bears are cool!", I thought, not knowing that they were indeed quite evil, as a certain Mr. Colbert would have you know. I checked the book out, and began to read. It was difficult to get into at first - the writing was very articulate and very English, but I had already read The Lord of the Rings trilogy (even though I had to force myself to continue at some points), and so I had confidence I would be just fine. I had never read a book like The Golden Compass before. It was remarkably intelligent. It said something meaningful and original. I had never encountered such complex themes before; for instance, the Church in the novel experiments on children (poor children, of course) in order to try and "save" their souls, when in actuality, due to their faith, they completely misinterpret a natural scientific phenomena, and then kill the children's souls in their misguided attempts to save them from "original sin". Factor in how Mrs. Coulter (Nicole Kidman), the Church's appointed agent to oversee the experiments, would never allow herself to be subjected to such an experiment -and actually gets off on watching the children suffer- and you have a portrait of how 'divine appointment' is just an excuse for sadists and psychopaths to assume positions of power, and then not have to answer for their crimes, whether it be torturing children in a fantasy novel, or raping altar boys in real life. Its religious themes aside, The Golden Compass is also remarkable for its none-to-subtle championing of feminism, and the acceptance of sexual and ethnic minorities. Whereas countless fantasy novels have paid vague lip service to such themes with limp allegory, Pullman dispells dancing around such subjects, and lays them bare. Lyra, the heroine, thinks of female scholars in her world as jokes, because that is the attitude held by the male scholars who run Jordan College, where she lives. When she comes to our world in the second book, she is surprised to find the scientist she seeks is a woman. That woman is Mary Malone, a former nun who abandoned that life when she realized it was sexually repressive to women, and denied her basic human needs and wants, such as love. Back in Lyra's world, Pullman insinuates that Mrs. Coulter is only able to ascend the ranks of power because she is extremely beautiful, and she uses this weapon to appeal to the priests in charge. With these examples, Pullman points out how patriarchal religious organizations are obsessed with, and try to dominate and control, the sexuality of women. And in a particularly daring move that has yet to be picked up on by fanatical Christian detractors, Pullman depicts an actual gay couple, kissing and deeply in love with each other. Oh, and they also happen to be angels, ratcheting the subversiveness up a few more notches. He even has the character Will, an adolescent boy, be admiring of the angels' deep love for each other. With these and other examples working their way throughout the trilogy, Pullman establishes himself as quite possibly the most accepting, progressive author of fantasy literature writing today. As if the themes of the novels weren't potent enough, the books themselves are exciting, disturbing, moving, and ultimately brilliant.

Now, after spending an eternity championing the books, how does the film version of The Golden Compass hold up? Remarkably well, as long as you are a little forgiving, and know going in that the theatrical cut is a butchered slice of studio interference. It is almost comical to watch early trailers for the film, in which nearly half the scenes shown are not in the film. In fact, one can gather from the snippets shown in trailers that Chris Weitz's original cut was remarkably faithful to the novel. The only reason the film went overbudget was due to New Line hacking the film down, wounding the narrative flow, and rendering much of the film nonsensical, which then required the need for reshoots to try and make the plot work. Originally, the film followed the book's sequence of events; one can see this in the trailers, which depict Lyra falling out of Lee Scoresby's balloon, as she does in the book, and this is what lands her in Svalbard. This entire scene was cut, which then required reshoots to somehow establish how Lyra got to Svalbard; cue a convenient Samoyed attack. Serafina Pekkala, the witch queen who aids Lyra in her quest, has several scenes cut which help to establish her character; Eva Green has stated that an entire scene was filmed where Farder Coram emerges from inside the Gyptian's boat, sensing her aboard, but she goes invisible to hide from him, and when she reappears to Lyra after he has gone, she is crying. Her first appearence in the film is also problematic; she simply appears, and basically says "Oh hi, I'm a witch!" This kind of rapid introduction plagues most of the characters in the theatrical cut. Also a problem is the ridiculous pace and the editing, most likely, again, a problem caused by suits hacking up the film. Some scenes lack basic transition shots, such as the first scene among the members of the Magisterium. We suddenly jump cut to a bunch of sinister priests sitting in total darkness - we don't know where we are at first, and the transition is jarring and annoying. As if that weren't enough, their expository dialogue is awful - another flaw that the film suffers from at times. Those instances aside, the film flows far too fast, but is still compulsively watchable. Chris Weitz's eye for visuals is genuinely impressive; this is certainly one of the nicest looking films to come along in quite some time. The production design is beautiful and immaculate, and the substantial bit of money that went into the film certainly shows up onscreen. Simply put, the locations and machines in the film are brilliantly realized to such a degree that the way they appear onscreen is virtually indistinguishable from the way I envisioned them as I read the novel. This perfection of design extends to the casting: Dakota Blue Richards is Lyra. Nicole Kidman is Mrs. Coulter (and the blonde hair makes sense, seeing as her daemon and wardrobe is all gold). The extensive supporting cast, including Daniel Craig as Lord Asriel (the beard works, but I like my Craig shaven, thank you), Eva Green as Serafina Pekkala, Sam Elliott as Lee Scoresby, Ian McKellen as the voice of Iorek Byrnison, and Freddie Highmore as the voice of Pantalaimon -just to name several- are all impeccably cast. Alexandre Desplat's score is suitably epic and grand, and he even manages to sneak that trademark undulating electronic bass of his in there at a few points. So, with all the technical aspects being spot on, the story elements have to satisfy at least on an equitable level. Unfortunately, this is not entirely the case with the theatrical cut. The story itself is a great one, but the way the present cut is edited, and the way the plot has been restructured, seriously lessens one's enjoyment and interest in the preceedings. That isn't to say the film is not enjoyable and interesting; it's still extremely entertaining. In an unexpected twist, the plot restructuring actually works in one instance: the fight at Bolvangar comes before the bear fight at Svalbard in the novel, but the events are reversed here, which makes sense on a cinematic level, as the battle at Bolvangar is bigger and a more fitting conclusion. However, had the original ending not been cut (causing reshoots for a very weak new epilogue), the film's original structure could have been preserved. It's infuriating to think that what is quite possibly a great fantasy film, and a fabulous adaption of a great novel, has been hacked apart by studio suits into something that is merely just 'very good'.

The biggest issue for me with this film, since the first announcement of it's production, has been the excising of the religious themes to appease the lunatic Christian fringe. In the weeks leading up to the film's release, I had read numerous reviews for the film, all of which would say things such as "it's completely sanitized." People who had read the novel and seen the film also even complained that the it was watered down, and they didn't have a clue as to how the next two novels would be adapted. To this, I must say: were you watching the same film I was? The men of the Magisterium dress like priests. They talk about heretic. Mrs. Coulter has a religious mural depicting the Kingdom of Heaven on her ceiling. The "Magisterial office", where Iorek's armor is kept, has paintings of saints and angels on it. Well people, if it looks like a duck, and quacks like a duck...

One thing several critics have also pointed out is that the film has seemingly replaced the theme of totalitarian religion with just "authority" in general. They cite this as a fault, saying Lyra's battle against "the authority" is watered down and contrived; just a simple "follow your dreams" message. This simply shows their ignorance of the source material, or how ridiculously inattentive they are. When Mrs. Coulter says the word "authority" near the end of the film, it's "The Authority", capitalized, ie *GOD*. The Magisterium is The Church in this film. The speech about Adam & Eve and original sin is still here, it's just not fleshed out. Weitz has not sanitized the themes of the novel; he has disguised them so that they can be explored in full in the sequels.

In its present form, the film is better than the first installment in the Lord of the Rings trilogy, and if there is any kind of justice in the world, The Subtle Knife and The Amber Spyglass will be adapted to film as originally planned. The His Dark Materials trilogy has the potential for greatness - but only if the sequels are even greenlit, and New Line backs off from making any artistic decisions, while Chris Weitz lays off the expository dialogue. If the trilogy is left incomplete, it will be tragic missed opportunity.