Cinema Talk

More of the same here, but also a step up from Il vangelo secondo Matteo for Pasolini. Again, an adaptation of ancient literature and again, it’s his probing verite-esque camera following a character around, and as always, there’s some sloppy ends. However, for the most part, this is one of his most accomplished films and by that I guess I mean it’s the one with the least amount of “self-indulgence” as well as the most mature. Of course, it still feels a bit amateurish at times, but that is part of Pasolini’s charm. I don’t mean this in a kitsch way, but his eagerness as a filmmaker is a strength, not a weakness.

Just as with Matteo before, Pasolini has a lot of ground to cover here in the life of Oedipus. As is the case, we get a lot of ellpises, though oddly enough they are balanced out by rather long extended sequences of just Oedipus wandering around in the desert. It’s these sequences that make Pasolini seem like a more subtle filmmaker, one whose films might not be accused of “being all over the place.” While it is a far cry from being as meticulous as something by Bela Tarr, or even Stanley Kubrick, there’s a least some hint of shots being constructed, rather than halfheartedly being pieced together. That sounds critical but again, I can’t stress enough that I actually like these elements of Pasolini’s works.

While Edipo re does look nicer than Matteo and does sort of flow in a way that not even my favorite Pasolini film (Mamma Roma, still) can, there are some problems. I get that Pasolini liked Franco Citti a lot, but he really hams it up here. Perhaps this was intentional, a decision made by either the filmmaker or the actor to underscore the whole “tragedy” element by making him lose his mind from time to time. It actually works in the film’s finale when Oedipus blinds himself, but that’s because it’s a really personal, but awkward and heartbreaking moment.

One of the most notable improvements from Matteo is Pasolini’s use of music, which is especially effective in the film’s final “modern” sequence. Where as Matteo was driven by Bach into a forced sense of “seriousness” the simple flute music here works very nicely and is a superior compliment to the more poetic, voiceover scenes. It’s a little difficult to avoid comparing this to Matteo, especially since Pasolini did make a film in-between them, but they are both trying to accomplish the same sort of tone and vibe. This is a little bit more successful in my opinion, though there’s things to like (and dislike) about both. Oh, and there’s color.

At the very least, one has to give Pasolini credit for making a story arc as familiar and overplayed as that of Jesus be somewhat gripping and interesting, especially considering the fact that he’s dealing with his entire life. We get the immaculate conception, the crucifixion and everything in between. All the lore of the miracles, the disciples, the unintentional provocation of the world are all photographed in a rather matter of fact manner. There’s an obvious poetry in all of Pasolini’s setups, though. The camera seems to gravitate around all the actors even as others recite extended monologues, all of course coming from the source material. It’s an odd experience, that’s for sure, and like pretty much all of Pasolini’s work, seems like it shouldn’t work at all yet somehow does.

It’s a pretty good idea to at least have some sort of appreciation of Pasolini’s career (in film or elsewhere, which I guess would just be poetry) because his style is so potentially polarizing. He’s been called amateurish and shaky, but to me, that is all part of his charm. Sure, those aren’t the qualities that any filmmaker wants to be defined by, but the “messy” nature of Pasolini’s film career makes his work feel all the more personal. In this case, it is especially important since the story of Jesus seems so impersonal and I don’t mean this as a slight to any religious organizations or religious people. The story concerns the savior of mankind, but Pasolini forms a portrait of a revolutionary that just happens to be the most important one in the history of the world.

I think the single most remarkable aspect of this film is that it essentially tries to create its new language. Sure, the cinema verite approach is not, at least on paper, totally revolutionary, not even in Pasolini’s own oeuvre, but how it’s connected with content that is almost exclusively poetic and/or romantic is sort of brilliant. Sure, there really isn’t a need to focus in on the miraculous nature of Jesus’ life, but when it comes to his extended monologues, which almost bring the film to a screeching halt, those poetic touches do wonders. Sure, a lot of the movie is just people walking around and in all honesty, Pasolini was not nearly as fantastic at photographing landscapes as his fellow countrymen Antonioni, but there is an odd beauty in close-up faux-steadicam shots of people’s faces.

Perhaps there’s a little of Korine here too, which I guess could be enough to turn enough people away, but that’s sort of a fair warning. There’s these odd little sequences that are surreal and sort of grotesque, the leper is one of the first things that comes to mind, but there’s also the spontaneous moments like Jesus’ angry tirade at the expense of a village market. It’s funny, but the movie’s best moments are the ones that seem the least memorable. Somehow, I think that a good representation of the movie as a whole. Sure, you get the big stuff, but it’s Pasolini’s little touches that elevates it beyond being an adaptation.

It’s been a very, very long time since I’ve last encountered Sergio Martino. Since then I’ve developed a theory that although he was an extremely skilled filmmaker, he was always held back by his content. This is never more evident than it is here in which he takes a pretty ridiculous story, complete with noir-inspired conventions and terrible music, and dissects it with his otherwise fantastic aesthetic. While it is a bit upsetting to see such obvious talent wasted on the b-film level projects he devoted his career to, I think there’s actually a charm to them. It’s bizarre to see some of the most groundbreaking technical work for the time masked underneath some pretty pedestrian narratives.

I’ll give the story here some credit: it’s pretty confusing at first. It’s not nearly as elliptical as it should be, but the opening is stitched together in a way that immediately separates Martino from most conventional action/horror/whatever other genre you can place this film in directors. Unfortunately, this makes the moment in which the story’s skeleton becomes visible even more laughable. Our protagonist, seemingly out of nowhere, becomes detective Paolo Germi. His intricate (to say the least) plan to discover the killer of a woman he met at a dance hall slowly begins to unfold, along with the help of his comic relief sidekick, Giannino.

Another jarring element, aside from just the general lack of tremendously interesting happening on the screen, is the music which seems like it was written for a silly detective TV show. It’s hard to fully embrace Martino’s brilliant command of montage when it is being overwhelmed by such dreadful music. It’s another case of the film selling itself short: it has this terrible devoted noir detective complex guiding the story, but there seems to be something more in detective Germi. It’s in his eyes in the opening scene at the dance hall, which I guess is to help contribute to the surprise of finding out he is a detective later on. At the point, he becomes merely a chess piece of justice, a hero without any depth but with all the traits that the genre has already ascribed to him. It sounds a lot worse than it is considering the fact that it only takes about fifteen minutes to realize the movie isn’t going to be some significant artistic statement, not even for Martino’s standards. It’s a piece of popcorn entertainment, but its just one that happens to be expertly crafted.

I wish I could go back in time and give this movie to myself about five years ago. Since such technology doesn’t exist, I just have to enjoy this movie as a nostalgic liking for the time whenever I liked “subversive” films the way I once did. There’s a still a lot to like here. It looks beautiful and unravels in this fascinating yet slow way. The problem is that I guess I’ve gone a little soft on such subjects. Yeah, I admire something for being this weird and transgressive and whatnot. But it ultimately comes up on the side of being brutally cold. This works for some people, Bruno Dumont comes to mind. In the case of Lanthimos, though, it just seems a little too much when paired with something that’s pretty miserable to think about in the first place.

The story concerns a unidentified family. The father is the only working individual in the family of five, the rest are imprisoned in the jail that is the family’s yard. The father tells the children lies of another offspring, whose disobedience led to his death. The outside world has little to no influence on the family until the father resorts to hiring a colleague, Christina, to satisfy the son’s “urges.” Eventually, she becomes a similar tool for the older daughter. Sex creeps into the family’s blood stream, and it starts to tear them apart.

Lanthimos is working with the same cinematic vocabulary as the aforementioned Bruno Dumont and the similarly sterile Michael Haneke and while he gets all the technical stuff right, the extremism displayed in the film’s story threatens to overwhelm all of his other qualities. I don’t mind that the film is frank and disturbing, or even that it manages to be funny within the same scene (a la Todd Solondz, I suppose) but instead that the film’s brute force almost makes it feel a bit didactic. Contrary to one clearly confused Netflix user, this movie is not a cautionary tale about homeschooling. This sounds pretty comical for anyone who has seen the film, and that’s because the message, if it is there, seems like it would be a bit more consequential than parenting, especially since the father is closer to a breeder than he is a parent.

This is probably where the film loses me. Okay, you’re never going to be able to make a subtle or open-minded film about a Josef Fritzl-esque character, but I guess I have to blame it on the subject matter being so displeasing in the first place. I never felt uncomfortable (save the “tooth” scene) but even that wouldn’t be a problem. While I was always fascinated by each character, I found their emotional trajectory to be a little short. So you live in an impossible household, welp, that sure is bad. Maybe emotional relation is at fault here? I don’t feel for the characters anything other than pity. They don’t even seem real, though I guess that is sort of the point.

In an ongoing project to thrust myself back into the life of cinephila, I’ve decided to become completely random with my viewings and dive in head first to uncharted territory. This is some pretty ridiculous rhetoric to start a review, but it explains why I just started with one of Ritwik Ghatak’s most praised works, rather than going in chronological order like I once used to do. Whatever the case, there’s still enough positive things here for me to want to return to his work. Although this isn’t nearly as refined as Satyajit Ray’s earliest work, it is of the same vein, but with its own quirks, some of which become sort of bothersome.

Bimal is fascinated with his car, ney he is absolutely in love with it. While it does provide a mean of income, his relationship with his old Chevy, which he affectionately refers to as Jagaddal, is unhealthy to say the least. Not only does he put hours of work into it, but he also takes the slightest bit of criticism as disrespect. Since the car itself is rather old and not so efficient, nearly all of Bimal’s customers find it humorous. This doesn’t sit well with him, and it contributes to his emotional collapse.

There’s definitely something silly about the story, the fact that it really is about a man and the love for his car. One could argue that movies can’t be compelling without a relationship between two humans. I’d argue it have to be living things (dogs are acceptable, more of these movies are needed for the record) but ultimately, the subject is him and his disconnect with the world. It’s funny, as crazy as Bimal is viewed by the outsiders that come close to him, he would have fit in perfectly with 1950s American car culture. There’s not really that sad, poignant implication of the west’s influence on Indian culture. His infatuation is completely foreign to everyone else in the film’s world.

It’s easy to make a quick comparison to Ray’s earlier (I’m thinking pre-1960s) films, but Ghatak has a slower, less “fly on the wall” style, closer to being an anticipation of that glacier minimalism that is dominating China last time I checked. There’s a lot of nice long, static shots in which we get to observe Bimal and his “shenanigans” in a really objective way. It’s definitely one of the most memorable elements of the movie. Unfortunately, another equally memorable element is the non-diegetic sound that is used to personalize the car. It is  unnecessary and completely intrudes on the film’s earthy, quiet tone. Still, it’s a pretty remarkable movie.