The Unbearable Empty-ness of Being Cute; or How to Sweep the Oscars

Michel Hazanavicius' "The Artist" is going to sweep the Oscars tonight (and as I am posting it, the prediction has come true). Every single award ceremony this year stands testimony to that. Indeed, if it does not, we can in all justification call it a 'revolutionary' day. And all we know revolutions do not take place in Hollywood. I also suspect all 'miracles'; they belong to the lazy and the guilty.

I condemn that. I know it is slightly stupid to condemn an Oscar favourite. (Who is being naive now, Kay?) But I still condemn because it is an issue that is not restricted to one single film. I condemn a trend.
"The Artist" is an almost silent film, and IMDB lists it as a 'romance'. It was shot in colour, and then transferred into black-&-white in the post-production stage; if you observe the light flares in certain shots closely, you will be able to deduce it. Which is a godsend, because that is the only worthwhile thing you might do during the screening.

The story of the film is abysmally simple. Once upon a time--and did I tell you I hate that beginning?--there was a great silent film star. In Hollywood mythology, great male stars are always from the silent era. The concerned star here is a combination of many such real figures, but the main reference here is obviously Douglas Fairbanks. He also has a dog (reminded me of Asta from the Thin Man series), a chauffeur, a disgruntled and cold wife (Penelope Ann Miller, wasted here), and a mansion. An ordinary girl bumps into him in front of the media glare, capitalizes it to gain a foothold in the industry, and a couple of films later, the star finds himself going through the ignominy of multiple takes so that he could dance with the girl working as an extra. In the meanwhile, sound comes. The star laughs at it. Does not think it is worth a penny. We all know what happens after that: he becomes bankrupt. But the girl's love must get him back. Does she succeed? Producers love such 'succinct' scripts; you can sell it to a stone-deaf man reading it aloud!

Then there is another film which plays through this one: Singing in the Rain. In fact, the male-female duo almost explicitly re-enact the same relation. Both the stars of the film--Jean Dujardin and Beatrice Bejo--are good dancers, and there is a bravura long take of their dancing at the end of the movie. A happy account of film history: silent era transformed itself to become the Musical!

Is there anything else in the movie? Yes, there is. None of the plot mentioned above are beyond and above the mannerism of the film. Indeed, the whole film plays like a museum slide-show of lost mannerisms and quirks of silent films. Problem is, if you have seen silent films well enough, you will find them ludicrous. And isn't it sad to find a French director equating the whole of silent cinema with Hollywood, that too a very limited perception about its complexity? What troubled me even more is the fact that the film could not decide what it wanted to be: an allegory of an ego-bound man's redemption, or a discourse about silent cinema, and stardom? But that is not a fault, or even a mistake. That is the signature of certain types of contemporary film. I call them the 'cuties'.

Hazanavicius and Dujardin, both of their previous claim-to-fame was through making nice and domestic-quality spoofs. In one sense, this is also a spoof which has lost its teeth. It does not know what to bite, it might have even forgotten that it is supposed to bite. There is a contemporary euphemism for such films: homage. But let us not bemoan the collective bad taste of our contemporaneity.

Spoof, as a genre, or even pastiche or homage, are necessarily bound to their reference, thus much more topical, contemporary and thus intentionally political than other films. You can not justify a spoof simply by saying I wanted to make one; you have to show more reasons. When spoof as a genre began to emerge as a major generic force in the Western world, it was downright subversive. When Mars Attacks! was made by Tim Burton, it not only lampooned Independence Day, it took mega-size pot-shots at American politics and mass culture. What followed next was the oft-repeated story of the domestication of a powerful cinematic weapon by the industry, and a slow dissipation of its energy into other fields and interests.

By the time "The Artist" is made, a pastiche or a homage has ended up being an euphemism for the most superficial brand of nostalgia films. In one sense, The Artist is a biopic that does not even want to go through the rigour-s of one. The psychological depth of a star's narcissism is lost in the quagmire of stylistic bravura. There is a section where Dujardin's character finds himself unable to produce sound in real life as well. Brilliant touch, but does the film follow it up? No, it does not. Is the film even knowledgeable by half about the silent film industry it refers to? No. The film resembles two things, firstly, a Disneyland trip through the supposed 'old golden age', and the crowd-pleasing antics of movie-stars doing 'numbers'. And I think that is precisely why the movie 'sells' across barriers, and is a darling for both Cannes and Academy Awards. And it is a crying shame that it is the recent bed-partner of Independent Spirit awards as well. Where is the spirit, dude, let alone the 'independent' part?

What we have in our hands is a new cinematic trend. In one sense, you can compare it to 'political correct-ness', although it is much shallower than that. It is a cinematic practice that carefully and almost pedantically sanitizes a film of all excess, depth, decision. It is the art of making a film without making one. You tell a story, but it is not 'your' story; you have a style, but not 'your' style, but always of someone else. And it is here the spoof/pastiche/homage angle comes in. This technique of talking in other's voice and accent comes from those genres. But unlike a true generic film, films like the "The Artist" has nothing to say beyond impersonation. If you take away the stylistic and other stereotypical quotations from "The Artist", you will be left with nothing. For a spoof, that is never the case. Thus, it is obviously symptomatic of a malaise that "The Artist" sweeps the awards and "Hugo" is left with technical awards, as if one is dealing with a Harry Potter franchise here. Obviously, serious engagement with history is too dangerous for the Cinema honcho-s of our time. [My friend Iman Mitra has promised me a piece on Hugo and The Artist, which I shall publish on this blog. With his erudition, I think he will delve much deeper into the comparison. I am merely extemporizing my feelings here]

Cinema is not supposed to be 'safe', and not supposed to be 'cute'. Even the most reviled populist films of Bollywood has more edge than this one. We live in an age of empty gestures, impersonations, stylistic pirouettes, technical skulduggery. As a historical period, it reminds me more of the Mannerist period of painting in Italy. We are exhausted of the creative achievements of our periods. The sterility of our imagination finds its best use in impersonation.

I think my point is buttressed by the fact that Maryl Streep winning the Best Actress statuette. She is a great actress, but in this particular film, she is left impersonating furiously with no character build-up whatsoever. It was role which went nowhere. And now, we have a candidate who won the prize simply because she could impersonate so well! Which is however better, because the Best Actor's performance consisted of being charming and showing a good set of teeth! Yes, I understand one feels nostalgic about Gene Kelly and his peers, but that does not justify valourizing a medium-quality impersonator!

If we love cinema at all, if we believe that it has the capacity of thought and expression, if we think it is more than a joyride, we need to condemn it, not just because of personal distaste, but because we are responsible as a community.

GREAT FILMS: ELEPHANT(2003) BY GUS VAN SANT (WINNER OF PALME D'OR,CANNES)

When the tone poem “Don Juan” by Richard Strauss, the great German composer and not a relative of Johann Strauss, was premiered in the year 1889, half the hall cheered and the other half booed. This told Richard that he has found his own musical voice, and he wrote:

“I now comfort myself with the knowledge that I am on the road I want to take, fully conscious that there never has been an artist not considered crazy by thousands of his fellow men.”

After the controversy about his 2003 film “Elephant”, director Gus van Sant could have proudly reiterated that. This is a great film, this is an extremely unlikely film to be made in Hollywood, and it is a miracle that the film was ever completed. It unanimously won the Palme d’Or at Cannes; Todd McCarthy of Variety magazine said that the film is “pointless at best and irresponsible at worst”. Are you wondering why there was such bipolar disorder among critics? I will tell you. But before that, let me tell you one thing. If you want to know whether a film is really good or not, go to the Europeans (not the British), and stop believing the Americans (especially the critics). They are genetically impotent of anything higher than good mediocracy.

First, I must tell you how I discovered this film. It was 2:30 AM of stark, cold night; I was deep into a movie binge. Then I decided to go to bed. Before that, I switched the TV on. It was HBO. The next movie, they showed, was something named “Elephant”. I liked the cinematography from the trailer, so decided to go through the first few minutes, and then go to bed. I did not sleep that night. I was feeling like a new-born.

I am not kidding. That’s what a good film, especially when it comes as a surprise, can do to you. From then on, this film became a personal obsession for me. For the record, in last two years, HBO showed this film only once. Unfortunately for HBO, they sponsored this independent film. Well, enough of oblique talk, lets come straight to the point. Who is this Gus van Sant? All of you have seen at least one of his films: “Good Will Hunting” (1997). Do you think that is a great film? It is not, it is just a very good Hollywood film. You might have seen another of his movies at Z MGM of past: “To Die For”, with Nicole Kidman starring as a murderously ambitious weather-girl manipulating her husband and an unstable boy (Joaquin Phoenix) obsessed with her. Gus van Sant is primarily an independent moviemaker who made it big in Hollywood with “Good Will Hunting”. He made only two mainstream movies after that; he understood the limitation of Hollywood factories to be debilitating for a truly original director, and he left. Here is what he said, “I came to realize since I had no need to make a lot of money, I should make films I find interesting, regardless of their outcome and audience.” Gus van Sant came into his own with his later works, especially in his “Death Trilogy”. Elephant is the second film of the trilogy. What is “Elephant” all about? It is about a massive shootout inside a school, an event strongly resembling the Columbine School Massacre. The reason people got angry about this film is because it is only about the shootout; in other words, it does not provide any reason, background, or cure, it just states what it wants to state. It does not let you close the case shut, and move on after the movie. It keeps the problem open. The difference between “Elephant” and other inane “issue-based” “movies with messages” is the difference between polemic and sincere thought. The difference between political parties and Karl Marx. Between “kitsch” and “sublime”. The greatest thing about this film is that it refuses to essentialize anything and problematizes everything. It is unbearable for the American media to see someone thwart the “great” reasons and cures they have formulated and transmitted everywhere for years, unbearable to see someone denuding the mystic glamour of its favorite events, events that they cover inch-by-inch, second-by-second, deaths they have shown in all their glory; it is unbearable for them to see themselves naked and waxed like a freak. In its after-effect, “Elephant” is a destroyer of myths and myth-builders. If you conform to stupid ideas such as “Films Propagate Violence among Kids”, “Consumerism Kills You Spiritually”, “Charity will One Day Make Every Poor Rich” etc, then you will not like this film. But in that case, you should not like me. Because, if you follow a logical sequence starting from those quoted presumptions, you will end up at the statement “We Are Worse than Baboons”. In case you accept those oft-repeated statements I have put under quotation marks, please accept this as a truth. It might end up being self-reflexive.

Now, for the remnant, are you quizzing yourself why this film is named “Elephant”? There is no reference to any sort of an elephant in the film (other than a pencil drawing in one of the protagonist’s room). There have been many interpretations of the name of the film; some say it is a tribute to a BBC documentary made by Alan Clarke of the same name; I prefer a different explanation. The title is an allusion to the Indian fable “Blinds Watching an Elephant”. Most of you know the tale; blinds cannot gasp the reality of an elephant wholly. What Gus van Sant means here is that we cannot understand the enormity of a homicide only through analytical reason; whenever we try to interpret, we distort the image by essentializing it. “Elephant”, on the other hand, deconstructs the event [in the strictest Derridian sense. You have to see the film to realize how closely it reads the events]. In that respect, this film is truly post-modern (not in an “ism” sense, but as a time&space-frame), and a close relative to films like “No Country for Old Men”.

“Elephant” is one of the most poetic films I have ever seen. It is made of extremely long tracking shots filmed through SteadyCams. Harris Savides’ cinematography astounds even after watching it thrice. The film follows several students throughout the huge school on an ordinary day that ends up being the date of the shootout. There is violence in the film, but they are not violent. Gus van Sant strips the killings of their glamour, effect, convention and polemic by making them anemic; he shows what they really are: repetitions of video games, simulation of a simulation. The deaths in this film are “cool”, or even “cold” in a Marshall-McLuhan-Jean-Baudrillard sense. The film does not try to analyze its characters; instead it respects their privacy (when a student enters the classroom, the camera remains outside). One of the shooters, Alex (played by Alex Frost) is an accomplished pianist. He played Beethoven’s “Fur Elise” in a long sequence, and that music becomes the theme (the score is actually played by the actor Alex Frost). It is one of the most serene and memorable use of Classical music in a film I have ever heard. The cinematography in reminiscent of the great Hungarian director Belá Tarr, and in its empty uneventful nature, it reminds me of Michelangelo Antonioni at his best. Also, one can say that such film-making signals a return of Cinema verité.

The film was shot in an improvisational way. There were no dialogs in the script; they were made up by the actors ad lib. It was an inspired choice, as it helps the film to avoid “meaningful”, cliché films. Everyone looks so real that it might scare you. In fact, all the actors in the film are amateurs; many of them were from the school where the film was shot.

Some people complained about some essentialisation in the film: the shooters watch a Nazi propaganda film; they play a video game where they shoot people. That disturbed me for some time: are they not trying to propagate a “message”? But then I realized where my, and other critics’, problem lies. We forget the fact that Americans are the largest consumer of Nazi propaganda products. We forget the fact that it is natural for a teenager to play a shooting game on his laptop (I do the same on my desktop). Film directors are not responsible for our thoughts, responsible for the conventions we unconsciously follow. It is a major lesion we often tend to forget.

Roger Ebert once wrote a very significant thing about Hollywood: “when it comes to tragedies, Hollywood is in the catharsis business”. It is not even a truth, it is troth. They are into other monkey businesses too. Hollywood is the pinnacle of professional, segmented film-making; but to be a true Auteur, you have to stop formalizing films. And great films only come from true auteurs and that too once in a while [that does not mean there are no auteurs in Hollywood]. This is one of those films. If you ever felt love towards the medium called film, you should watch this movie. It is a film that dwells at a different level of film-making altogether, a level rarely reached by filmmakers, rarely enjoyed by cineastes. See whether you like it or not.

N.B:--This film was produced by Diane Keaton. I am a big fan of her work, and I think producing this film should be counted among one of the greatest things she has ever done. Without a free leash, and without the producers not “peeing” [a word used by Gus van Sant himself] on the film, such movies cannot be made.

BAIDURYA CHAKRABARTI