Manhunter

(Michael Mann, USA, 1986)

The latest stop on my Mann retrospective. A thoroughly engrossing serial killer film, as well as a well-wrought story about obsession and identity. It's also incredibly visually rich. You can see a lot of the tropes of serial killer films getting their start with this picture - the psychological profiling, the arch-mastermind villain of Hannibal Lecktor, the evil misfit of Francis Dollarhyde - who is offered a near-miss shot at redemption. It's far more impressionistic and analytic than most of Mann's oeuvre, playing with subjectivity in a way that feels totally unique and comes across as pretty damn unsettling. As usual, Mann has a tendency to overplay his hand in the atmosphere department, pushing some of the scenes too far into the stylistic and emotional stratosphere. But the overall impression is deeply affecting - a very scary and suspenseful movie. Philosophically, it doesn't delve as deeply as it could - another Mann limitation, but it does successfully toy with the opposition between the American ideals of Normal and Aberrant. This time, the criminal archetype is beyond the pale; we're talking pre-De Niro existential sexiness. Noonan's Dollarhyde is a portrayed as a monster, but due care is given to his potential for redemption, even if he never achieves it. This is in keeping with Mann's social and legal outsiders, who share a commonly tragic fate. The tragic paradox, for Mann's characters, is that they only feel truly alive while outside the trappings of the social contract, but they are always tempted to return to it, and this is the impulse that inevitably leads to their undoing. Mann's temptation is to Romanticize his characters, but ultimately he finds their fate tragic, not heroic. Here, the protagonist is the hero and the villain, with Dollarhyde being a kind of stand-in for the darker impulses he keeps well hidden when he's not chasing serial killers.

The Social Network

(David Fincher, USA, 2010)

- Fundamentally, not about Facebook: well, yes and no. It isn't about Facebook per se, but about the implications of Facebook re. our culture - a mirror, and not a very flattering one.

- Zuckerberg's motivation being prestige, most importantly. Power. Which leads to money, which he never wanted - he wanted something money can't buy.

- Facebook as being, structurally, hierarchical. Whether or not Z was ever interested in money (as the movie emphasizes, more than once, he was not) is immaterial; the very institutional logic of the corporation means that power will be concentrated overwhelmingly at the very top. As Slaverin says, it's like a Final Club, except they're the president.

- Again, a repeated trope is the nebulousness of Facebook - "all we know is that it's cool;" and the subsequent resistance to monetize it through advertising. A) this raises all sorts of fascinating questions about how we assign value in contemporary (late-capitalist) culture, the ambivalence toward advertising, and the final truth that Facebook now does have ads. It was - again, looking at the institutional structure of Facebook, as a for-profit, hierarchical organization, inevitable that it incorporate ads at some point.

- Exclusivity: Perhaps the most central point. It isn't about Z as a jilted lover, or even as a social climber; but the entire culture's obsession with exclusivity; again, reflected in Facebook, the way in which value must be assigned according to what is left out, cast aside. That's what makes Facebook cool - the fact that only certain people make the big decisions about who's in and who's out. This is, in some ways, the one aspect that has changed most about Facebook - it is no longer so exclusive, but it really is, it has just changed forms - it is Z's dream that Facebook will be indispensable to all.

- Roll of the Winkelvi - competition (the rowing race sequence); their apology to their father - the divided face of the Elite: naive "we're all gentlemen here" affectations of honor, and cut-throat, mercenary viciousness, but also a terrible sense of pride, a woundedness coming from the inevitable reckoning of a game they helped engineer, in which the winner takes all, and all that matters is the first one to the finish line.

Men With Guns

(John Sayles, US, 1997)

I'm a big booster of Sayles's movies, but this one was something of a disappointment. It's a well-made film by any objective standard, but it doesn't feel particularly vital or urgent, which has at least something to do with the urgency of the subject matter. Rather than making the world of the film come alive, it feels too often like Sayles was conducting an academic exercise, scrupulously reporting the tragic woes of South and Central America; it brims with solemnity but mostly feels inert. Flat-footed pacing and an arid tone aren't new features of the Sayles canon, but when he's really cooking, he makes his simplicity and earnestness work for him, slyly evoking emotion from unpredictability even as he seems to be the picture of classicist storytelling.

Some of the blame could probably be leveled at the premise; John Sayles, the indie-man's indie director, makes a film in South America (the locale is never specified exactly), with a South American cast, and with an almost exclusively Spanish script. There's a whiff of do-it-because-you-can attitude to such a proposition, and in the end, it doesn't deliver on the gambit. The scenes are often plodding and disconnected from each other, the flashbacks feel forced and superfluous, and the overall impact is one of weary respect, but for me, lacked admiration. The strongest element by far is the acting, which gives rise to some flashes of beauty and lyricism that are otherwise largely absent. In Sayles quietly epic folktale, he stumbles in his attempt to meld quiet gravity with the inevitable enormity of Latin American hardship, but I can't bring myself to fault him for trying.

Tickets

(Ermanno Olmi - Abbas Kiarostami - Ken Loach, Italy/UK, 2005)

Not bad for an omnibus flick. That's a bit of a lame qualifier, I'll admit, since the omnibus enterprise is pretty much always compromised, or at least is always regarded as being necessarily Less Than, according to the doyens of cinema taste. And such a qualifier is, therefore, a truism; the episodic structure will always be less than the sum of its parts, and inevitably invites comparisons between the parts, which tend to be inflected with matters of personal taste - certain directors will be given a pass, while others will be pooh-poohed in light of what some may consider the company of their betters. On top of all of that, the efforts to tack the separate pieces together almost invariably come across as either hopelessly contrived or annoyingly whimsical at best. So it's a fallen form. So what? Despite all of that, it can be fun, and it has the tendency to take on a kind of quasi-democratic flavor; it might not be the sexiest idea in existence, but it has a way of revealing things that might otherwise remain hidden.

So here goes: the integration isn't ostentatious, it's functional, and that's point one in favor of Tickets working at all. The stories all take place on, you guessed it, a train, during a single trip to Rome. They start in the terminal, and although the majority of the action is confined to the train cars (an inherently cinematic form, with all sorts of nice synecdoches that needn't be too deeply elaborated on here; suffice it to note the shutter-like whirring of the outside world through the windows, the opportunities for chance encounters, the linear structure, which gives a clear sense of space and propulsive motion, as well as a neat metaphor for the inexorable and sometimes blindingly rapid passage of time, which of course is mitigated by fantasy and memory, hallmarks of cinema, etc. etc. - you get the point) there is plenty of the outside world that the stories refer to, be it temporal or spatial, these are all people only partially living in their surroundings.

As should probably be expected, there's a fair amount of political content to the piece, again using, in a way that doesn't quite always prevent cloying emotional cues, the structure of the train: some people ride first class, some second, and the necessary tensions that arise in such a compressed, laboratory version of society. Plus we've got Ken Loach on board, so a certain volume of social rabble-rousing is safe thing to bet on.

And Loach's segment, the last chronologically, is the best by a hair; Kiarostami, ever the enigmatic formal trickster, has great fun and shows his chops without ostentation, but doesn't quite get the same mileage from the medium as Loach. Olmi, whose work I'm not familiar with, proves to be easily the weakest link, and the most glaring example of the futility of overall cohesion when embarking on, yes, the omnibus film. Olmi's piece, which opens the film, is pleasant but overplays its sentimentality. It's not a bad concept, centering around a lonely pharmaceutical chemist on his way to a grandchild's birthday, and who is stirred by a sudden crush on a gorgeous woman who arranges his fare. But the execution is middling at best - its basically a whimsical romance that turns into a humanist pat on the head, and the attempt a depicting autumnal longing feels labored and even a bit bloated.

When the masters come to take their turn, its about as good in both cases as would be expected. An interesting side effect is that both Loach's and Kiarostami's pieces seem to hint at the greatness of the respective filmmakers, but actually do more to highlight their shortcomings. Kiarostami's oblique segment, with its slow reveal of character and circumstances, has some brilliant moments, but leans too heavily on what is unspoken and un-shown. As usual, he creates tension by what he withholds, only here, it seems as if he's teasing us rather than hinting at something truly substantial; as far as I can tell, it's a clever rumination on sexual politics, but it feels minor and overly clipped. It might be that, absent the long stretches of time K is used to having to let his poetic scenes really ferment, the substance winds up feeling a bit weak. This is really a quibble, as I feel there's something I'm missing about this segment, but I can't quite put my finger on it. Which is typical for Kiarostami, the only difference being that usually you know you've seen something profound, even if it's impossible to articulate - here, it's like you've just seen the trailer.

And so Loach also shows some of his limitations; the tendency towards sentimentality is seen quite clearly here, and is especially prominent in one scene. Basically, Loach is a realist who often wears his Lefty sentiments prominently on his sleeve, and to the casual or inattentive viewer, it might seem like that's all that's going on here. But Loach is a deeply empathetic humanist, and his best work achieves a transcendent poetic sparkle that's something akin to an English cousin of Whitman - his deeper subject has always been the empathetic possibilities of the human heart, and the way in which power structures tend to complicate that facet of our character. Here, we see the closest thing to a classical narrative, excellently structured and with plenty of suspense. But once the story's dilemma has been confronted and solved, there's a scene of beautiful and riotous release that seems to string together all the themes of the segment, and even the whole film; people helping other people, and the way in which the human spirit can circumvent and overcome oppression, be it bureaucratic, emotional, or physical.

So not bad for, y'know, one of those films.

The Messenger

(Oren Moverman, USA, 2009)

Unfortunately, a string of well-crafted vignettes that never fully cohere. Taken separately, many of the individual pieces deserve admiration. Ben Foster and Woody Harrelson are fantastic, deftly playing off each others' bravado and vulnerability. Samantha Morton is, as usual, spot-on, although her character doesn't get the same kind of care the script gives to the two male roles. It's well-shot, evenly paced, and avoids the kind of easy emotional notes that are endemic to the wounded-warrior film, in which characters are given fifty-yard stares and sudden bouts of violence, but not actual development. The Messenger manages, for the most part, to address the emotional toll of combat without reverting to cliche - mostly through its attention to the quotidian details of the protagonists' duties. Unfortunately, these elements, even when combined, don't contribute to a memorable story.

And that speaks directly to the problem - a marked lack of narrative urgency, and a setting that feels far too familiar. We've been here before, heard the stories about guns and bombs and guilt-wracked soldiers, some of whom manage to get by, and some of whom break down. Even if Moverman manages to imbue the genre with appreciated subtlety, it doesn't change the overall sense of exhaustion that an audience encounters when faced with this well-worn territory. Because as well-executed as the film is, it isn't adding up all that well. There's a feint towards an ethical dilemma, where Foster's character becomes attracted to Morton's bereaved wife, but this is treated, like the rest of the scenes, as an episodic interlude, and doesn't significantly contribute to the development of either character. Morton confesses to Foster that she's relieved her husband is gone - that he had become, in her eyes, irredeemably warped by war. But this is revealed in a lengthy monologue that feels theatrical and belabored, for all of its striving towards pathos. I'm aware that this could very well be part of the point - that the story is relating the repetitive drudgery of the death-notifiers work, and the general pointlessness of the war when confronted with the tragic toll in human life, the lack of direction, no end in sight, and all that. And it is effective at generating a sense of outrage over the state of perpetual war that we're currently in. But that's a losing proposition, from the perspective of the audience's emotional engagement. You just wind up feeling spent and bitter. There are genuinely moving moments, but they are counterbalanced by a refusal to show the kind of change of character that would generate some sustained interest.

In the end, it's a frustrating disappointment - one of those films whose heart is in the right place, but one that can't seem to see beyond the benevolence of its intentions and its own carefully-constructed sense of sympathy. It is remarkably well-constructed, but unfocused and redundant feeling. Rather than add up to a vital, multi-layered whole, it remains a series of scenes, like a high-level workshop for writing and acting; related, but not finally essential to, each other .

Taste of Cherry

(Abbas Kiarostami, Iran, 1997)

Another stop on the long journey through the classics that I've passed over, and an immensely satisfying one. What can I say? Kiarostami is a master, and this film only further solidifies my admiration for his work, which started with (and which may never be surpassed) the lightning-in-a-bottle magic of Close-Up. Here, we see a relatively straightforward narrative of a man on a mission - he's determined to die, but he needs assistance with the burial, and on the sliver of a chance that he survives the night with a bellyful of sleeping pills, someone to help him out of the grave. Kiarostami keeps the camera set-ups simple, and the action is repetitive in a poetic way - Mr. Badii has meandering conversations with a few individuals before finding one who will help him, and there are long sequences of dialogue that take place in Badii's Land Rover, which we see wending its way through the dusty hills outside of Tehran. The pace is slow, but there's an intensity produced by the performances, which are consistently excellent. Homayoun Ershadi's Mr. Badii is a model of simmering anguish, a portrayal that projects determination, despair, exhaustion and urgency all at once, without a single instant of excess technique. His would-be accomplices, most of whom appear to be non-actors, are similarly excellent, and the movie deserves gushy accolades just for containing such top-notch and affecting performances.

Kiarostami's MO is fascinating, and seems to work through the combination of parable-like simplicity with a realist, almost documentarian taste for detail and patient observation. How he manages to get such excellent performances without making them distracting, and frame the action so simply yet so profoundly, is a delicious mystery. Amid the current international turmoil and recent focus on the pitfalls of artistic expression in contemporary Iran, its interesting to see a film that plays its political cards so close to the vest, but the effect is invigorating and further underscores Kiarostami's genius. There's a subtle commentary at work here on the economic separations between different classes in Iran, but the main focus is on the metaphysical conditions of the characters - a free-floating loneliness that they deal with in varying ways, but which seems to be a common thread in their lives.

Of course, there's the bemusing ending, which defies all the inevitable speculations on what will happen, and relieves the considerable suspense that's been generated at that point. I'm not sure I get it - my first response was that it was tacked-on, a po-mo flourish to avoid the obvious creative decisions, none of which would have been easy: does he live? Does he die? Do we get to find out one way or the other? Kiarostami opts for something like the third choice, leaving us some uncertainty but allowing a mood of redemption and a potential solution to the crisis that has befallen Mr. Badii. We may never know what he found so unbearable in life, but Kiarostami seems to be suggesting that in relating his story, and some of the apparatus used in re-creating it, there is another way to live. Art might hold the answer, or an answer, even if it isn't the one we think we are seeking.

Ghosts

(Christian Petzold, Germany, 2007)

After having seen the excellent Jerichow, I promptly added the other available Petzold films to my Netflix queue, and this was the first to arrive. Overall, it's a strong film with several good cinematic ideas, but it doesn't create a lasting emotional resonance, and its ambiguity ends up feeling a bit on the forced side.

Petzold does a number of things very well - he knows how to shoot and cut, he has a flair for using diagetic music in an immersive way, and he works exceptionally well with actors. The two female leads in Ghosts are tremendous, and the film gets a lot of mileage out of their performances. But he keeps things so hermetically tight that the story never really engages, and it ends up seeming like a squandered opportunity. Petzold's structural ideas are fascinating, but he doesn' t seem willing to fully commit to them, and the film ends up caught in a weird emotional limbo between the Dardenne brothers and Michael Haneke. This probably sounds more interesting than it really is, and winds up dwelling in the weaker areas of both of those respective styles.

It could be a mood thing. Lately, the razor-sharp construction and tonal restraint of certain European directors has been wearing thin for me. For all of their clean lines and perfectly modulated rhythm, I can't help but be irked by their misplaced sense of economy. What exactly is gained by all of the mood they forgo? It isn't some kind of new angle on realism, since there generally is a favoring of structure over depicted behavior. Usually, these films play out in semi-parable mode, relating a crisp little distillation of key events, but the set-pieces contain plenty of, as it were, negative space - mini-meditations on the characters in quiet rooms, driving, etc., which will occasionally be interrupted by some emotionally jarring moment. I can't say exactly what it's all in aid of, but I can say that it's not to my current taste, as much as I once admired it (probably for what it wasn't.)

But such meta-concerns aren't really fair critiques of Ghosts, which, like I said, contains some very cool stuff, such as the sequence where the two girls go shoplifting, and Petzold cuts from the security cameras to the hand of the wacky mother character at exactly the moment we expect to see a guard descend upon poor hapless Nina. The beginning of the two girls relationship is likewise very well-handled; it manages to be delicate and volatile at once. But elsewhere in the film - especially the travails of the older married couple, things stall out and get wearisome. It's good to know that Petzold got his act together for Jerichow, but things here aren't quite up to snuff.