I’ve seen over the last week three things I quickly throw out to my blog-buddies, each of which seems structurally familiar yet each, in very different ways, shakes and maybe even re-shapes the foundations of the genres they inhabit.
Margot at the Wedding, as the title suggests, could in summary seem like that most classic of comedic forms: a family riven by internal tensions comes together away from home (in that green world, here signified by the old family estate on some more remote island), after lots of struggle, in the summative, regenerative ritual of marriage. Almost. Noah Baumbach’s film distills every drop of rage, misbegotten desire, envy, and fear underneath (all?) comedy, strips away every last bit of comforting repression–and leaves us with a raw, raw film, as if Cassavetes and Rohmer had a kid who was pissed at how soft his Dads were. Great acting, across the board, with a particularly fine Jack Black, and a never-better Jennifer Jason Leigh, but–c’mon, the film belongs to Kidman. I caught a stray thirty seconds of Bewitched on cable television the other night, before my eyes burned and I had to look away… and you just wonder where she goes when she’s shooting such malarkey, because when she shows up for Baumbach or Glazer (the terribly underrated Birth) she’s fearless and utterly compelling. God, she’s horrible–HORRIBLE–in this movie, and yet engages our empathy…
Great movie.
Paprika‘s on another plane of existence, a cartoon–wait, I mean “anime”–pastiche of Spellbound and pop culture and psychoanalysis and… it’s a film about films, it’s a film about dreaming, it’s maybe an allegory of mass culture, it’s maybe a funny sneaky antidote to mass culture, it’s maybe a celebration of every aspect of imagination, from the most plastic cheap knick-knack to the most cherished personal fantasy. The plot, such as it is, involves the stolen DC Mini, a device which lets therapists enter dreams; its loss sparks investigation, reveals grand dangerous plots, and almost destroys the world. Sort of. Who cares? The plot’s not the thing, it’s the play — I enjoyed every frame of the film, lush with detail and ideas. Really a kick.
Finally, I’m three episodes into a lovely strange Canadian sitcom called “Twitch City,” conceived and written by its star Don McKellar, who’s made some great small films and here sets up seemingly familiar elements of the sitcom (a youthful loser/slacker, obsessed by television, unwilling to do much of anything; a peppy youthful not-really-slacking-but-not-really-doing-anything-either roommate and potential amour; an anal not-at-all-slacking-yet-also-not-really-doing-anything roommate, dating the potential amour and standing in the way, and…). They have a cat, who figures prominently in each episode, in riffs strange and delightful. (My favorite moment: McKellar’s Curtis, watching a show about hero pets, yelling “Useless!” at poor Lucky.) The show is nothing like what you expect, and is just tremendous fun to watch. Oh, and Bruce McCulloch is a recurring ‘guest’ (on the television, playing Rex Reilly, an unctuous talk-show host, doing episodes that Curtis can’t bear to miss like “The Woman Who Looked Like Joyce DeWitt); I’ve read that, in the sitcom’s second season, McCulloch had to leave, so Mark McKinney pulled a Darren and took over the role. The show’s weird and witty, in the best Canadian way. And at only 16 episodes and 2 discs, easy to watch.
Yes, Kidman is fearless and her work in this film is lacerating; her character’s passive aggressive power grabs are intensely uncomfortable to watch and therefore highly pleasurable. I was struck by the scene in the bookstore and the way the father’s role in these sisters’ personal trauma bores up to the surface for a few stray moments, reminding the spectator how little they know or even can possibly understand as to why these characters, bound by blood, do the horrible things they do. Bambauch seems to have some lingering daddy issues, nes’t pas? Still, the film knows no boundaries and it’s hard not to compare/contrast it with The Squid and the Whale. That narrative, perhaps because it was so informed by autobiography (if the tabloids are correct), felt more reigned in, more controlled, and, therefore, more honest and emotionally engaging. Margot at the Wedding struck me, as a whole, as over-indulgent, sloppy, maybe even lazy in places.
I saw Paprika in the theatres and it is indeed a visually complex delight. I second Mike’s nod!
I think Margot is a messier but more ambitious, more challenging–and in my mind more successful–film than Squid.
Another rec: Steve Buscemi’s Interview is essentially a two-hander, a grumbling smug journalist (played by Buscemi) sent on what he believes to be an irrelevant fluff piece, interviewing sensation Katya (a surprisingly excellent Sienna Miller). They spar; the conversation, the emotional back-and-forth never quite goes where you expect, is consistently entertaining… we both ended up enjoying the film, for its many great moments (surprisingly moving, caustically nastily funny). I’m not sure it adds up to much, but… still worth the time. And Buscemi’s a strong director–despite the strict limits of a stagy conversation, I found the film visually effective, as well as superbly acted.
(Has anyone seen the original film by Theo van Gogh?)
OK. I had a similar experience with Margot as I did with Before the Devil Knows Your Dead–a kind of vertiginious emotional overload. I do believe Margot to be both messy and ambitious, but I also felt as if Baumbach offers us a triumphant parade of passive aggressive open wounds (and little open wounds yet to be). The film lacks a center (maybe Turturro?) and try as I did, it was a challenge to find my way in. It’s not so much that I need narrative (or moral) symmetry in a film (nor do I want to think I desire/need a certain measure of comfortable repression to make everything go down smoothly), but I do think what makes a good film good is the filmmakers’ ability to draw some kind of line in the sand.
Still, I love Nicole and would rather watch her in a messy ambitious indie than most any other star I lurve. If you click on the link, you’ll have to scroll to the top of the page.
i could swear i wrote a comment about margot. it’s a wonderful film which is growing on me the longer it lives in my memory and re-creative imagination. see if it you haven’t. great quirky look into the fragile bond that connects someone who has a traumatized past to oneself and one’s alter egos (siblings, children). perfect acting. super duper jack black.
i saw paprika last night and wow. i recommend a look at the extras, especially the one in which the writer of the “avant-garde” novel on which the cartoon is loosely based appears. the cartoon, sorry, anime, is directed and drawn with absolute genius by satoshi kon, who drew much of the storyboard before deciding how the story would end, thus, as mike points out, making the end kind of irrelevant and the story definitely non-linear.
chiba atsuko’s character is perfect. she’s the psychoanalyst you’d want to have if you were inclined to doing psychoanalysis and you had the money for it.