The Ones That Got Away

This last year at the movies was, at times, buzzing with critical acclaim, as one film after another opened to a frenzy of "hurrahs!". A few of these pictures, however, left me cold. Here's a list of five 2003 movies that, given my high expectations for them, in one way or another disappointed me:

Lost in Translation (Sofia Coppola): I enjoyed it, and it had some beautiful moments, but it could have been so much more. Its premise had potential, but it never went beyond the standard Japan-101 portrayal of Tokyo. You had the arcade rooms, the karaoke, the dutiful hotel clerks, the neon lights, the silly game shows . . . everything you'd expect, without any surprises. I felt that the movie wanted to create a deep sense of place and failed: all we were offered was a stereotypical, cartoonish Tokyo, as opposed to the mysterious, multifaceted Tokyo of Chris Marker's Sans Soleil (1982), or, for that matter, the Berlin of Wim Wenders' Wings of Desire (1987). Those movies created a real sense of place by exploring the contradictions of their locales; Lost in Translation did not. As a result, I found Sofia Coppola's film somewhat on the xenophobic side: it lazily settled for the standard crazy-Japanese-not-being-able-to-speak-English jokes. Anyway, that's all on the setting front. As for the storyline itself, it reminded me a bit of Woody Allen's Manhattan (1979), but without any of Allen's wit. I grant that some of the film was genuinely funny, some of it genuinely touching (like the final scene), but the whole enterprise never really got off its feet.

21 Grams (Alejandro González Iñárritu): What almost made this movie work was the acting, which was terrific. Sean Penn and Benicio del Toro were both excellent, and Naomi Watts delivered the performance of her career. Otherwise, I felt that the film pretended to have a lot more to say than it actually did. If it wanted to be a meditation on the bleakness of American life, it never grounded its tragedy in a sense of place, a sense of what American life really is, complete with the little things: the dialects, the humor, the colloquialisms (see David Denby's review of House of Sand and Fog, which is similarly flawed), the mundane topics of conversation that helped situate and heighten the sense of "reality" in a film like Mystic River. (A. O. Scott discusses this quality of Mystic River in his review of the movie.) Its non-linear structure seemed like more of a gimmick than a necessary feature: it didn't reveal anything new, and the story might have packed more punch if it were told in a straightforward fashion. None of the characters really surprised or moved me: after all, we've all seen the deeply religious criminal and the outwardly happy but inwardly tortured housewife before. In the end, even with its fine performances, the movie never seemed to truly care about its characters: it merely used them to make a point. And what was the point? That life sucks? I felt manipulated, to a certain extent, by 21 Grams. For all its stylistic virtuosity, it remained, at its foundation, shallow.

Big Fish (Tim Burton): The whole time I was watching this, I couldn't help but think: this is Tim Burton's response to the critics. I had the feeling that the movie was self-consciously flaunting itself as "Burton's masterpiece." All I can say is it backfired. Burton never disappoints when it comes to visuals, and his recreation of a storyland world was inspired and perfectly conceived. The problem was the narrative. Now, something like Edward Scissorhands (1990) works, in my opinion, because it knows exactly what it wants to be: a fairy tale. As a result, it feels assured: it always knows exactly what note to hit. Big Fish, on the other hand, flip-flopped between fairy tale content and an earnest domestic drama, and the switches in narrative always felt clumsy, as if Burton wasn't sure what he should aim for: farce, fantasy, character drama? The jumbling of moods and tones might have worked if one commented on the other—for example, if we felt a real connection between the story of the old Edward Bloom and Bloom's tales of his youth. Instead, these two realms seemed to belong to different movies. As an ardent Burton fan, I expected great things, but Big Fish was limp, and my pick for Burton's "masterpiece" remains Ed Wood (1994).

House of Sand and Fog (Vadim Perelman): Vadim Perelman's directorial debut was ambitious: it wanted to create sympathy for two characters who ostensibly had no sympathy for one another (at least for most of the film). The movie aimed high but fell flat, because it seemed to truly care about only one of these characters. Given the previews I had seen of the movie, I went in expecting Ben Kingsley's Colonel Behrani to be painted as something of a villain, though a sympathetic one. The reverse wound up happening. I cared a lot more about Kingsley, due in no small part to his wonderful performance (as well as that of Shohreh Aghdashloo, as his wife), than I did about Jennifer Connelly and her character's troubles. The film became one-sided. Connelly is a good actress, but she didn't have anything to work with: all her character did was whine, cry, look angry and then helpless, and attempt suicide. Matters were made a whole lot worse by her love interest, the policeman played by Ron Eldard. Whatever sympathy I may have had for this cop was blown to the wind when he threatened deportation to the immigrant family. And maybe that was intended. All of these characters were obviously weak in one way or another. But the film ended up being only halfway successful: I cared deeply about the Colonel and his family, and nothing else. As a result, the tragedy that arose felt like less of an organic manifestation of these characters' wills and flaws than a contrived setup manufactured to make the audience cry. It didn't seem inevitable, as great tragedy should. It seemed implausible.

American Splendor (Shari Springer Berman, Robert Pulcini): This one's probably my favorite of the five "disappointments": brilliantly acted and at times hilarious, it took an "ordinary" narrative about "ordinary" people and did some wonderful things with it. However, I think it could have gone further, explored more. Like Lost in Translation, American Splendor was full of promise and never delivered. Near the beginning was a great introductory shot of Harvey Pekar, as played by Paul Giamatti, looking sullen and bitter, walking down the street on a cold, gray day. Giamatti did a terrific job in this movie, but the development of his character, who turned out to be anything but ordinary, basically stopped at the "this-guy's-a-weirdo" mark. Did we ever really get past that opening expression on Giamatti's face? Through the ups and downs of the narrative, the film never really plumbed the depths of the character; instead, it settled on his wacky eccentricities. The same can be said of all the major characters: in the end, they were strange, and not much more. Sure, they may have been endearing, but that doesn't mean they were complex. So what did American Splendor really say, other than: "Look at these people, they're delightfully weird"? Don't get me wrong, this movie had its moments, and a lot more sheer humanity in it than most films. But, again, I would say it missed its shot at greatness.

Comments

[Di]

I only saw two of the five movies you discussed here but you verbalized the exact things that bothered me about Big Fish and House of Sand and Fog. ESPECIALLY House of Sand and Fog. Just that word, "contrived," hits it on the head. And I never thought about how their fate didn't seem inevitable, as you said, like a great tragedy should; but it's a very good point. You're making me think. I like it.

[rei]

I loved Big Fish and Lost In Translation. I never looked at their hails and hurrahs.