November 7, 2008
Reprise (2008) ***1/2
Directed by Joachim Trier
Plot: Two Norwegian best friends, Phillip and Erik, mail their first completed manuscripts at the same time in the hopes of receiving recognition for their talent from those that are a part of the literary elite. Phillip gets published immediately, while Erik receives rejection. Sadly, Phillip can’t hadle the pressures of success which eventually causes him to have an emotional breakdown. Meanwhile, despite his failure, Erik’s life comes together quite well—that is until he submits a different manuscript which does get published. Phillip, now that he’s out of the spotlight, begins to pull his life back together, and because the two seem to have some kind of yin-yang thing connecting them, Erik starts to fall into some of the same traps that came close to ruining Phillip. Is there a way both can be happy and successful at the same time?
Review: Trier, who co-wrote the screenplay, is certainly a gifted filmmaker. There are moments in Reprise that are simply fascinating—the best of which occurs within the first five minutes of the film. There’s a moment where Erik and Phillip are dreaming of success as they drop their manuscripts into the mailbox. Trier cuts to a shot of their potential books’ back covers to show pictures of both distinguished authors. Then the pictures start to move, showing a moment where each young man shifts position so that another picture can be taken. Through this scene, Trier smartly establishes the deep connection between these two.
Erik and Phillip have been inseparable since they were kids, always relying on the support and approval of the other. Unfortunately, when fame and recognition are bestowed only on one of them, their friendship in a way becomes psychicly destructive. Clearly, Reprise is a meditation on the downside of great achievement, and it is a good one at that. It’s shot fairly realistically with occasional surrealistic cinematic flourishes. Yet, there’s a mystical tone which makes the film that much richer.
However, Reprise isn’t a great movie, and I’m pretty sure Trier set out to make something glorious. One of the biggest flaws lies in the performances of the two inexperienced Norwegian actors, Anders Danielsen Lie as Phillip and Espen Klouman-Heiner as Erik. Both are magnetic presences on screen, and both have quite a lot of potential. Unfortunately, their acting skills are distractingly amateurish. Considering that Reprise has its share of heavy melodrama, a higher quality of acting would have been necessary for all scenes to be universally exceptional.
I look forward to what Trier releases next. As a meditation on aspiration and public acceptance, Reprise hits the nail directly on the head. Trier deserves fame and fortune for his achievement here. Hopefully, karma won’t be such a bitch with him as it was with Phillip and Erik.
The Darjeeling Limited (2007) **
Directed by Wes Anderson
Plot: Three adult brothers, Francis (Owen Wilson), Peter (Adrian Brody) and Jack (Jason Schwartzman), travel to India after their father’s funeral in order to bond spiritually and perhaps also to visit their mother who lives in a Buddhist monastery. Clearly, these three have never been close, and their idiosyncrasies absolutely get on each other’s nerves. Francis, whose face is bandaged due to a recent auto accident, is a control freak, which doesn’t bode well for their quest considering that the whole thing is his idea. Peter is a grim, ornery fellow who is preoccupied with the fact that his girlfriend is carrying his unborn child in her womb. Jack, the youngest, is impulsive, self-absorbed and sexually repressed. They spend their entire journey growing in their hatred towards each other. Though they accompany each other from one Hindu altar to another, it’s not until a genuine tragedy occurs that they can finally learn to love each other.
Review: Wes Anderson’s films—you love them or you hate them. Perhaps, there’s a more accurate third possibility. It might just be that you need to be in the mood in order to fully appreciate the layers of comedy on top of depressing drama which are so strong in every film he makes. There are moments in The Darjeeling Limited when I wanted to watch any characters in the world on screen other than these three nitwits.
Of course, Anderson wants us to hate his characters at times so that we can fall in love with them later on. I think that’s a risky expectation. I’ll go along for the hate-love emotional ride as long as the elements we should hate aren’t oppressively unlikeable and the elements we should love aren’t cheaply sentimental.
The fraction of The Darjeeling Limited that requested my hatred got it big time—and then some. The infantile bickering was not only cloying, but it wasn’t all that funny either. To make matters worse, much of this film takes place in a room on a train which amplifies its bleakness giving viewers an unwelcomed sense of claustrophobia.
Owen Wilson, who attempted suicide shortly before this film's release, is heads above the performances of his co-stars. He’s very funny, and best of all, he’s not trying too hard to be whimsical. Jason Schwartzman, on the other hand, is absolutely horrible, always saying every line with such false dryness that I wanted to kick him right in the middle of the forehead—I thought that would be an appropriate place to kick considering that Hindus thing that there lies man’s center of energy. Adrien Brody, meanwhile, doesn’t seem to try hard enough. Too often, he delivers his lines straight with a droopy expression on his face. Perhaps Brody switched to decaf while making The Darjeeling Limited because I’d say he performed at maybe sixty percent of what he’s capable of.
The only thing that elevates The Darjeeling Limited slightly above being called a total mess is the fact that the encounter the brothers have with a boy in a river does present a sense of awe and serenity. Anderson is a master at creating a powerful mood. Therefore, this sequence almost works as a kind of spiritual enlightenment in itself. It’s too bad that everything that comes before and after falls completely flat.
Ultimately, The Darjeeling Limited should have toned down its disagreeable elements while injecting more life into its situational narrative. Think happy thoughts, Wes!
Youth Without Youth (2007) *1/2
Directed by Francis Ford Coppola
Plot: Blah, blah, blah…
Review: Let me get this out of the way right now—Youth Without Youth is beautifully photographed. There are images that are almost achingly gorgeous.
Okay, now it’s time to spew the venom. Francis Ford Coppola has made a movie that is empty and meaningless in every narrative way possible. I think Youth Without Youth is about an old professor who gets hit by lightning which allows him to move forward in time while progressing backwards in his development so that he is able to look like he was in his twenties and thirties. Though he’s not living his past over again, he is able to be his past self as the future progresses, thereby changing the way he chooses to live. While he’s experiencing his progressing regressive existence, he’s accompanied by his past self at the same age who is trying to convince him to do what he would have done the first time he was as old as he is at that time.
Yeah, whatever! One of the courses I teach at the high school I work at is Introduction to Philosophy, which makes sense considering that I was a philosophy major as an undergrad. Recently a student asked me if she could take my film class next semester, but I told her that film was only offered this semester. I suggested that she take philosophy instead. She said that she didn’t think so since her father told her that philosophy is all about asking stupid pointless questions and giving meaningless answers that are only supposed to make someone appear smart.
This view of philosophy as sophistry is very common. Many think that philosophy is all about hoity-toity back and forths which have no pragmatic purpose or even any set of rules to follow. My fear is that anyone who watches Youth Without Youth will adopt this erroneous view of philosophy’s praxis. The dialogue, from Coppola’s screenplay, comes across as if Coppola just got finished taking a bad philosophy course at a two-bit community college which he loved and now he wants to call forth his own philosophical meditations much like Sartre or Kierkegaard. Well, Mr. Coppola, I’ve read Sartre and Kierkegaard, and you sir are no Sartre nor Kierkegaard!
Coppola is almost seventy years old. A movie like this one should have been made by someone in his twenties who just experienced some kind of intellectual epiphany and is now determined to arrogantly dot every I and cross every T regarding the questions of reality as such. Good philosophers and students of philosophy first strive to identify and articulate the limits set by a certain school of thought before attempting to understand nuances. It’s only after one really knows what he or she is doing that presentation of new possibilities ought to be attempted. Coppola tries to show how smart he is through Youth Without Youth. Again, at seventy, you’d think he’d have learned to cope with his insecurities. Youth Without Youth is a pile of visually interesting, pseudo-intellectual crap.
