(originally
published in The Outreach Connection
in November 2003)
This is the eleventh of Jack Hughes’ reports
from the 2003 Toronto film festival.
In the Cut (Jane Campion)
Campion’s best film
remains The Piano, and it seems
increasingly unlikely that she’ll ever top it – it’s in so many ways
unprecedented, as though it spring fully formed from some turbulent half-alien
dream. Her subsequent films (Portrait of
a Lady, Holy Smoke and now In the
Cut) all contain ideas as interesting as anything in The Piano, but they lack its astonishing visual and thematic
coherence, its fierce acting and icy weirdness. In the Cut, which has already opened commercially since its
festival screening, is being marketed as a thriller, with the particular
attraction of Meg Ryan in a hard-edged role involving several nude scenes
(which comes across as a calculated provocation). But it’s not thrilling at
all, and Ryan isn’t a particularly compelling presence in the film. It’s best
taken as a loosely assembled scrapbook of impressions and ideas about female
sexuality (for a near-definitive summary of these, see the October issue of Sight and Sound), with the ostensible
plot providing the loosest of governing structures.
Ryan plays a teacher
in New York who’s interviewed by a police detective (Mark Ruffalo) about a
brutal murder to which she’s a possible witness; they have an affair; other
strange men hover in the background along with a strip joint, phallic symbolism
and other relentless oddities. There’s a lot of talk about sex, mostly rather
earnest and knowingly raunchy. Ryan also collects lines of poetry that strike
her (often gleaned from subway ads), and several of the film’s conversations
involve the meaning of a particular word; the sense is of grappling for
language and meaning, with sexuality as the predominant input. The film is shot
in a claustrophobically jittery manner that made my wife physically sick, and
possesses a persistent morbidity that left a couple of other women of my
acquaintance nervous about walking home afterwards.
Some have compared
the film (particularly re Ryan’s character) to the 1971 Klute, which actually seems more astute and subtle about
compromised female sexuality than In the
Cut does. It’s also somewhat tempting to compare it to Catherine Breillat’s
work, such as Romance and Fat Girl – a comparison that further
underlines the latter-day Campion’s relative lack of discipline and analytical
prowess. Still, the film’s territory is inherently fascinating, and it does
teem with stimulation (of all kinds).
The Middle of the World (Vicente Amorim)
This year the
festival devoted its national cinema section to Brazil, under the title “Vida
de Novo.” In summarizing Brazilian films of the last few years, the program
book mentions Central Station and City of God, which I think may be the
complete list of Brazilian cinema that I’ve seen over that period. So many
resurgent national cinemas, so little time. I was only able to fit in one title
this year: Amorim’s debut film (I particularly regretted missing Carandiru, a prison drama by Kiss of the Spider Woman’s Hector
Babenco).
Middle of the World conveys a perhaps unavoidable ambivalence
about Brazil – on the one hand sweeping beauty and passion and pride; on the
other poverty and danger. The former generally carries more weight here though,
which is why some might think the film a bit soft (as much Middle of the Road as of the World).
A youngish couple and their five children cycle across the country to Rio de
Janeiro in search of work, stopping at way stations, sometimes picking up a
little money by singing and doing odd jobs, often going hungry. The eldest son
is on the verge of going his own way; the father tries to assert his authority
and keep his dignity even under these parched circumstances; the mother can
hardly bear it, but keeps going.
It's a vivid, fluent
film, packing a wealth of mood and incident into its concise 90 minutes.
Ultimately, it’s more a travelogue than anything else – the ending is
conventional, and the overall impression modest. You don’t feel the hunger and
the weariness of their long trip as keenly as you experience the momentary
pleasures of spontaneous music, or an encounter with some quirky character they
meet along the way. But it’s a pleasant counterbalance to the scathing vision
of City of God (not that I’m saying a
counterbalance was necessarily required).
Code 46 (Michael Winterbottom)
Winterbottom had two
new films at this year’s festival: In
this World, a documentary-style examination of Afghan refugees, and Code 46, an enigmatic futuristic
semi-thriller. In the last few years he’s also covered war (Welcome to Sarajevo), Westerns (The Claim), social drama (Wonderland), and an archaeology job on
early 80s British rock (24 Hour Party
People). Most of these played at the festival too. Only Party People feels at all vital, like a
film that he made because he just had to. Usually, his eclecticism and speed
seem like an end in themselves, as if his career amounted to some kind of
contest entry (he’d be a good foe for Lars von Trier in round two of The Five Obstructions). Unfortunately, I
don’t know of anyone who’s particularly excited by this, except apparently for
festival programmers.
I didn’t see In this World, but Code 46 (which somehow snagged a gala spot) epitomizes what I’m
talking about. It’s set in Shanghai, in one of those budget-friendly futuristic
environments that looks pretty much like the present day, with a few bits of
high-tech gloss and hints of Big Brother. It’s a more homogenized world too, at
least in the major cities; traditional culture has largely been pushed into
what’s called “outside.” None of this is particularly original or bracing, and
the plot resembles a deadened distillation of elements from Minority Report, Gattaca, Wim Wenders’ Until the End of the World, and others.
It stars Tim Robbins as an investigator who can read minds by virtue of an “empathy
virus” he’s ingested, and Samantha Morton as the quarry he falls in love with.
The overall arc is one of tragic romance, of humanity trying to assert itself
against increasing constraints. That reminds me of a lot of movies too.
I might have felt
unusually distanced from the movie because I had to watch it from the mezzanine
at Roy Thomson Hall – a location I detest. I can’t get wrapped up in an image
that seems so far away – it’s like staring into the bottom of a bucket (my
preferred spot is right up front in the second or third row, where it’s just
you and the looming screen). Code 46’s
forensic air probably suffered from this handicap more than a more exuberant
movie might have done, so I feel obliged to make this full disclosure. That
said, I’m still pretty confident the film doesn’t amount to much. Oh well,
maybe next year’s pair of Winterbottom movies will be stronger.
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