1/3/15 (Part One): Throwing the Baby Out With the Bathwater

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Alexa Havins, Alexia Rasmussen, cinema, co-writers, confusing, convoluted plots, drama, Erika Hoveland, Faust Checho, film reviews, films, insanity, Joe Swanberg, Kevin Donner, Kristina Klebe, lesbian relationship, lies, mental breakdown, mental illness, motherhood, Movies, Proxy, revenge, single mother, support groups, twist ending, writer-director, Zack Parker

Until it goes completely off the rails in the final third, sort of like a speeding train missing a dead-man’s curve and plummeting into a bottomless ravine, Zack Parker’s Proxy (2014) is a tricky, endlessly fascinating and constantly frustrating experience. As the film progresses, however, the numerous plot holes, leaps of faith and contrived scenarios begin to pile on fast and furious until audience members have but two choices: embrace the chaos and go down with the ship or jump overboard and swim for land as fast as possible. While I ended up going with the first option, wise readers would be well-advised to practice up on their backstroke: this is two hours you will never get back.

We begin with Esther (Alexia Rasmussen), a sad-sack, mopey single mother-to-be who’s on her way back from her gynecologist when she’s suddenly and brutally attacked by an unseen assailant: the attacker knocks her out with a brick and proceeds to bash her stomach until the unborn baby is just a memory. After she wakes up in the hospital, Esther is truly alone: she has no family, no friends, no significant other…even her pregnancy came courtesy of a sperm bank donation. As various authority figures like Detective Allen (Faust Checho) and Mary Wilkins (Erika Hoveland) hover and bustle about her, Esther keeps pulling back into her own world, even more isolated than she was before. As Mary warns her, however, Esther better get help while she’s still “in the system,” so to speak: once she leaves the hospital, no one is going to care a damn about her or offer her any help whatsoever.

Esther ends up taking the advise and finds herself in a “mothers in mourning” support group. While there, she happens to meet bubbly, blonde Melanie (Alexa Havins): still mourning the deaths of her husband and young son at the hands of a drunk driver, Melanie is, nonetheless, at least 1000% times more outgoing than Esther and the demure loner ends up hanging out with her, as the two stumble towards a tentative friendship. When Melanie begins to blow off Esther’s calls, however, the other woman begins to feel marginalized and depressed all over again. While filling out a job application at a department store, Esther happens to see Melanie, although the other woman seems way too occupied to notice her: when she spies her, Melanie is making a huge fuss about losing her son in the store, which strikes Esther as a neat trick, since the kid is, supposedly, dead.

As it turns out, Melanie’s husband and son, Patrick (Joe Swanberg) and Peyton (Xavier Parker), seem to be quite alive and quite well: when Esther confronts her friend with this information, Melanie freaks out and tells Esther to get lost. At about this time, we also meet Esther’s tough-as-nails girlfriend, Anika (Kristina Klebe): we’re introduced to her in a rather bracing scene that begins as what appears to be a rape but is later revealed to be very rough, albeit consensual, sex. Anika is both paranoid and constantly suspicious of Esther’s fidelity, neither of which make a particularly good combo with her violent temper.

Just when it appears that all of these disparate folks are headed for a violent, smash-up confrontation, ala Simon Rumley’s  Red, White & Blue (2010), Parker and co-writer Kevin Donner throw in a huge twist at the mid-point that spins the film off in a completely different direction. Unfortunately, this represents the first of many twists and turns that have the effect of jerking the film from one side to other erratically. As new plot points develop, bigger and bigger holes begin to appear in the film and, by the final 30 minutes, the whole thing has begun to disappear into a sinkhole of its own creation. By the time we get to the ending (yet another damn twist), so much of what came before has either been contradicted, forgotten or made redundant that it feels as if Proxy were actually three separate films stitched together: on their own, any of them might have been able to stay afloat. Shackled together, however, the disparate elements of Parker’s film pull the whole production down into Davy Jones’ locker.

Suffice to say, by the time it was over, my primary emotions were relief (this is an awfully long two hours, trust me), frustration and more than a little irritation: there were seeds of an intriguing idea here but nothing was developed in any satisfactory way. To this problem, add some truly erratic acting (Rasmussen is great as Esther, pretty much everyone else in the film is astoundingly awful and awkward), some painfully stilted dialogue and some enormous plot holes and contrivances…mix, bake at 350 and voila…you have one Proxy.

The hell of all this is that, at times, Parker’s film is actually pretty good. Rasmussen does a great job with a particularly tricky character (at various points, Esther earns both our sympathy AND our revulsion, which makes her a sort-of spiritual descendant to Travis Bickle, believe it or not) and definitely marks herself as someone to watch. The Newton Brothers’ moody, tense score is a mini-marvel: the duo was also responsible for Oculus’ (2014) excellent score and are handily establishing themselves as go-to guys for modern-day genre film scores. There were also some nicely realized visual flourishes and stylistic tics (my favorite being the slo-mo water dripping in the bathtub) that were definitely appreciated, even if the film’s general messiness and chaotic structure made it a little difficult to really focus on them.

Ultimately, Proxy ended up being one of the most disappointing 2014 films I saw all year: there was so much potential here, which made the results even more unfortunate. I’m not quite ready to write-off the production team, however: there were enough good ideas here to bode well for the future, provided that some measure of order is restored. As it stands, however, Proxy just isn’t very good, even though it could have been so much more.

12/14/14 (Part Three): I and I Can’t Survive

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1984, based on a book, British films, bureaucracy, Cathy Moriarty, cinema, confusing, dark comedies, dark films, doppelgängers, doubles, dramas, film reviews, films, Franz Kafka, Fyodor Dostoevsky, insanity, J. Mascis, James Fox, James Simon, Jesse Eisenberg, literary adaptation, loss of identity, Mia Wasikowska, Movies, Noah Taylor, office romances, Richard Ayoade, Simon James, Submarine, suicide, surrealism, The Double, UK films, Wallace Shawn, writer-director, Yasmin Paige

For better or worse, we appear to have experienced a bit of a renaissance in doppelgänger/double films over the past decade: The Prestige (2006), Timecrimes (2007), Moon (2009), Black Swan (2010), Another Earth (2011), The Face of Love (2013), +1 (2013), Enemy (2013), and The One I Love (2014) have all dealt with the rather nightmarish experience of coming face to face with yourself and the resultant difficulties that inevitably result from such meetings. While the above films are all (for the most part) as different from each other as possible, they all share the paranoid idea that, somewhere out there, there’s an exact duplicate of you just waiting to step into your shoes and take over your life. To this group, be sure to add writer-director-actor Richard Ayoade’s newest film, The Double (2014), a blackly comic adaptation of Fyodor Dostoevsky’s same-named novel that came out a mere two months after another similarly plotted film, Denis Villeneuve’s Enemy (2014)…talk about doubling your pleasure, eh?

What’s fueling this sudden interest in doubles? While plenty of folks have their own ideas, I think it has a lot to do with our society’s uncontrollable need to be “the best possible _____” we can be. In an age where fame is only a YouTube video away and social media contacts are worth more than any over-stuffed Rolodex, many folks must be coming to the conclusion that their “allotted” measure of fame has somehow been held-up, way-laid by some unknown force. If everybody is getting famous and you aren’t, there has to be a good reason: perhaps, just perhaps, you’re not getting what’s coming to you because another version of you is. Maybe you aren’t the next singing sensation because your doppelgänger already got a contract. Perhaps there’s another version of you that’s more successful with the opposite sex, wealthier, more powerful, etc…The whole concept of doppelgängers provides a handy “out” for those folks who just can’t seem to secure a foothold on the ladder of success: it’s not my fault…the “other” me got there first!

Jesse Eisenberg stars as Simon James, the neebishy, milquetoast and nearly non-existent office worker who toils his days away in an oddly anonymous company run by the eccentric fellow know only as The Colonel (James Fox). Living a life of quiet, tedious desperation, Simon has worked at the company for seven years, yet still has trouble being recognized by the overly officious front-desk guard (Kobna Holdbrook-Smith) or even his own supervisor, Mr. Papadopoulos (Wallace Shawn). Simon also pines, in silence, for his lovely, yet equally odd, co-worker, Hannah (Mia Wasikowska), although she doesn’t seem to exist, either. This doesn’t stop Simon from peering at her apartment through his telescope, however, but it does (probably) preclude him from ever asking her out. Not to put to fine a point on it but Simon’s life is pretty damn shitty.

Things take a turn for the bizarre one night, however, when Simon chances to see someone jumping from an apartment across the way: the figure seems to smile and wave at Simon before leaping, which the poor guy finds suitably distressing. Imagine his further distress, then, when he seems to spy an exact double of himself through another apartment window. Faster than you can say “double your pleasure,” Simon’s company has just hired a dynamic new employee, someone who looks awful familiar: James Simon. As is par for the course with most doppelgänger films, James is pretty much the exact opposite of Simon: he’s outgoing, boisterous, popular, suave, aggressive and sly, all things that poor Simon has no experience with whatsoever. At first, James offers to help Simon woo Hannah, in exchange for posing as him and taking some aptitude tests. In short order, however, James has insinuated himself into every aspect of Simon’s life, stealing the credit for his work, blaming his foibles (such as seducing Mr. Popadopoulos’ daughter) on Simon and getting extremely friendly with Hannah.

As James appears to take over more and more of Simon’s life, the other man finds himself losing what little identity he appeared to have. A co-worker calls Simon a “non-entity” and the loss of his pass-card puts him in a completely untenable situation: he doesn’t exist, since he’s not in the system, but can’t get into the system unless he has a card, which he can’t get unless he’s in the system…a classic Catch-22 if ever there was one. Just when Simon’s situation seems as hopeless as it could possibly get, he hatches a desperate plan to get James out of his life forever. Will Simon be able to reclaim his identity? Is James as real as Simon? Can two objects occupy the same space, at the same time? If not, who will be left standing when the dust clears: meek Simon or assertive James? But most importantly: just what the hell is actually going on here in the first place?

Ayoade’s adaptation of The Double has quite a bit going for, not least of which is the film’s intriguing look, a visual style which splits the difference between the lo-tech dystopia of films like 1984 (1984), Brazil (1985) and Barton Fink (1991) and something like the noirish Gothica of Proyas’ Dark City (1998). None of the machines in the film, office or otherwise, look quite “right” and it’s impossible to assign any sort of time-period to the film: it might take place in 1950, 2050 or 12050, for all we know. Despite looking great, David Crank’s production design does have one unforeseen side-effect: rather than feeling like Dostoevsky, The Double often feels more in line with one of Kafka’s paranoid nightmares. While other critics have pointed this out as one of the film’s most damning flaws, I must politely disagree: as far as your humble host is concerned, the film’s production aspects are the most impressive thing about it…dig below the surface, however, and things get a bit dicier.

For one thing, the acting in the film tends to be rather hit-or-miss. Eisenberg is quite believable as the neebishy Simon but somewhat less so as the charismatic James. While playing opposite yourself is never the easiest acting gig, I’m instantly reminded of Mark Duplass’ much more interesting, dichotomous performance in the far-superior The One I Love: in that film, Duplass was able to portray both halves of himself as completely different, if inherently connected, individuals…they walked differently, talked differently…even smiled differently. Here, the differences between Simon and James are not only less consistent (James is never quite as assholey as he should be) but far less interesting. While I’ve never been the world’s biggest Eisenberg fan, I fully realize that he’s capable of much more than he does here.

The actor who really gets the short-end of the stick, however, is Wasikowska. So fascinating and vibrant in films like Albert Nobbs (2011), Stoker (2013) and Only Lovers Left Alive (2013), Wasikowska is completely wasted here: made into more of a non-entity than even Simon, Hannah flits like a ghost from scene to scene, affecting nothing and matters not one iota, in the grand scheme of things. Her only expression seems to be a mild hint of confusion (or is it just gas?) and we get so little character development as to make her seem more symbolic than anything else. While several aspects of the film disappointed me, few were as vexing as the complete marginalization of Wasikowska.

The single biggest issue with the film, however, is just how hollow and meaningless the whole thing, ultimately, ends up feeling. While never intended as a particularly “warm” bit of entertainment, I was still expecting to feel something by the end of the final reel. As it stands, however, the only emotions I really walked out with were my previously mentioned disappointment, along with an overriding sense of frustration over the needlessly complex conclusion. Truth be told, the ending of the film makes absolutely no sense, even from a purely symbolic standpoint: perhaps I would need to go back and reread the original novel but The Double’s head-scratching finale felt more like philosophy freshmen riffing than any sort of “real” conclusion.

For all of this, however, I still find myself in the odd position of not really disliking the film…at least, not much. Despite the film’s many flaws, Richard Ayoade is an extremely talented filmmaker – his debut, Submarine (2010), is a rather excellent coming-of-age flick and the craftwork behind The Double is quite nice. I’ve always been a sucker for this kind of dystopic worldview and dystopia is one thing that The Double has in bushels. There are plenty of creepy moments to be found here (Simon’s first glimpse of “himself” is a real goosebump-raiser), along with some thought-provoking ideas about what it means to “be yourself,” as well as the frightening notion that, somewhere out there, there’s a more accomplished version of yourself then you’ll ever be. For a society obsessed with being the very best, this may be the hardest pill of all to swallow: no matter how much you want it, some thing’s are just out of your control.

6/4/14: Watching the Watchers

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alternate title, Chun Ho-jin, cinema, confusing, DMZ, film reviews, films, flashbacks, foreign films, GP506, guard post, horror, horror film, horror films, horror movies, infections, isolation, Jo Hyun-jae, Korean Demilitarized Zone, Korean films, Lee Jeong-heon, Lee Yeong-hoon, Lieutenant Yoo, military coverup, Movies, R-Point, race against time, soldiers, Su-Chang Kong, The Guard Post, The Thing, writer-director

If location is king, in horror films, than the oppressive, claustrophobic, abandoned guard post that serves as the setting for Su-Chang Kong’s The Guard Post (alt title: GP506) must be some kind of an emperor. Looking like some creepy mash-up of an insane asylum and old-school prison, the titular guard post is one sprawling mess of endless corridors, mysteriously closing steel doors and oddly oozing pipes. To add to the overall effect, the South Korean guard post is situated directly across the DMZ from the opposing North Korean guard post, with the live-wire tension from both countries never more than a hair-trigger away. It would make a helluva setting for any film, let along a horror film, and Kong uses it to masterful effect in his paranoid, grisly, kinda-sorta remake of John Carpenter’s The Thing (1982). If the actual film ends up being a rather jumbled, confusing but endlessly intriguing curiosity, let no one say that Kong didn’t wring every last drop of atmosphere from his location.

The film’s begins with a small troop of S. Korean soldiers pouring en masse into the titular guard post, GP506. At first glance, there definitely appears to be something wrong: despite the outpost’s “active” status, there’s no one around and the atmosphere is oppressive. Presently, the soldiers find the outpost’s occupants, hacked to pieces and stacked like firewood in one room, while a bare-chested soldier stands over them with a bloody axe, giggling. With that, we’re off to the races.

Sergeant Major Noh (Chun Ho-jin) is called in to investigate the incident, which carries a few qualifiers: since the head of the guard post, 1st Lieutenant Yoo (Jo Hyun-jae), is the son of a high-ranking military official (and currently unaccounted for), special care must be taken. The wrong move, wrong conclusion or wrong accusation could end Noh’s career, he’s told, and a contingency plan is already in effect: he has until six in the morning (roughly 8 hours) to get to the bottom of everything before military “cleaners” will be called in to erase all traces of the incident. Noh’s first task is identifying the mysterious axe-wielder, a task that proves remarkably easy (Noh is quite the sleuth, apparently), but the knowledge ends up bringing more answers than questions. When another survivor turns up, claiming to be 1st Lt. Yoo, the plot begins to thicken even more.

In time, Noh comes to realize that something evil has happened to the men in GP506. As he unravels more of the mystery, via journal entries and video-cam footage, Noh gradually understands that something infected Yoo’s men, something that caused them to go berserk and kill each other…something that may very well still be hanging around. As the clock ticks down towards 6AM, the situation in the guard post becomes more critical: Noh’s men are starting to show symptoms of the mysterious disease, symptoms that manifest themselves in such delightful ways as self-mutilation and uncontrolled rage. Will Noh be able to get to the bottom of the mystery before he and all of his men are killed? What is the true secret behind the tragic events at GP506? And why can they only account for 19 of the 21 soldiers at the guard post? Noh will come to realize that the no-man’s-land inside GP506 can be far more lethal than the one outside its doors.

Thanks to a truly great location, The Guard Post practically drips atmosphere from the very first frame. For a time, the atmosphere and rather vague storyline work hand in hand but, over time, the increasingly complex structure (multiple flashbacks that bounce back to the present with no warning, right down to matches-on-action) begins to wear one down (or, at least, it wore me down). Add to this the fact that nearly every character in the film, with the exception of Sergeant Major Noh, are fairly anonymous and interchangeable and you get a film that can often be downright baffling. At several points in the film, I felt completely lost as to the timeline, although everything ends up making more sense by the end (The Guard Post is one of those rare films where looking back on it actually tends to fix, rather than find, plot holes). Nonetheless, the film proved to be a particularly disorienting experience, especially once I realized that the subtitles on the streaming version of the film were incomplete, at best. For the most part, only the first part of any character’s speech was translated, leading to such gems of information as “Are you telling me that this is…,” “I can’t believe that you mean…” and “Is this like…” When their dialogue was short, this wasn’t an issue. Whenever things got expository, however, it felt like I was reading only page out of a stack of stenographer’s notes. Essentially, any of the connective tissue that I needed to really “understand” what was going on was missing. I got the general idea, to be sure, but I’m still frightfully short on the specifics, which is kind of a frustrating experience.

As a whole, The Guard Post is well-made and certainly reminded me of Kong’s debut, the much better R-Point (2004). The cinematography is evocative and atmospheric and the creepy score adds a lot to the feel. On the negative side, Kong seems particularly fond of an irritating “slow-down” effect that frequently made the image glitchy and added nothing whatsoever to the overall feel. The makeup and effects are all pretty top-notch and exceptionally gooey, particularly in scenes such as the one where an infected soldier is, essentially, shot into multiple pieces. The violence is never too in-your-face, especially as compared to other South Korean genre offerings, but it’s never shied away from, either.

Ultimately, I found myself rather conflicted by The Guard Post. On the one hand, I feel that it nailed its atmosphere and sense of creeping dread perfectly and Chun Ho-jin was a remarkably charismatic presence as Noh. Unlike the other characters, Noh actually felt fleshed-out and multi-dimensional, making his ultimate journey that much more tragic. Too often, however, it was a situation where one anonymous character would reveal something to another anonymous character, while I would patiently wait to see how it all connected. There were actually several moments in the film that approximated the “Aha!” moments from medical TV shows like House and these always felt strange and out-of-place, as if I were constantly missing significant information. The Guard Post is one of the few films I’ve seen recently where the style wins out over the substance, simply by virtue of it being easier to “feel” what’s going on rather than to “understand” the events.

Fans of South Korean cinema, as well as anyone who truly appreciates the rather narrow subgenre of military-themed horror films (consider me a huge fan) will certainly find lots to appreciate in Kong’s most recent film. For those who may have a little less patience, however, there’s much of The Guard Post that will come across as a hard slog through rough terrain. Perhaps it says something that I appreciated the film enough to actually watch a physical copy, sometime, and see if that annoying subtitle issue goes away. As it stands, however, The Guard Post feels like two-thirds of a pretty good film in desperate need of that missing part.

3/12/14: Like? Perhaps. Love? Not quite.

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American Civil War, Angels & Airwaves, astronauts, Capt. Lee Miller, cinema, confusing, film reviews, films, Gunner Wright, history of the world, humanity, insanity, instrumental score, International Space Station, isolation, Love, movie, music-based films, outer space, sci-fi, space station, stranded in space, stylish films, William Eubank, writer-director

I watch films for a lot of different reasons but one of the simplest (and most frequently disappointing) reason is out of curiosity. Sometimes, I’ll see box art, a title or a concept that just seems too intriguing to pass up, if definitively less than “must-see.” Over the years, my curiosity has led me in the direction of some genuinely great films (Lo, Botched, Stitches, Taxidermia) and some genuinely wretched films (Shuttle, The Hamiltons, The Hunt, Primal, The Last Rites of Ransom Pride, ad infinitum), along with a slew of films that I can’t even recall watching. Recently, my curiosity finally got the better of me and I watched Love, the sci-fi film featuring a musical score by Angels & Airwaves. I suspected a vanity project but was hoping there might be something here for a non-fan. In the end, this ended up being one odd film.

At its heart, Love is actually a few different films jammed together. The most interesting (and most cohesive) is the story of an astronaut (Gunner Wright) who ends up stranded on the International Space Station by himself. There’s also some sort of documentary in here, featuring lo-fi talking head interviews with various people about such fascinating topics as making the best of bad situations, how important communication is and how environment can affect relationships. There’s a bit of high-end music videos here, as well, as certain scenes are merely silent collections of images scored by instrumental Angel’s & Airwaves songs. There’s also something about the Civil War here but that part is so confusing and disjointed that is might actually be part of the astronaut story-line: I was never quite sure. Taken separately, only one of the disparate threads (the astronaut) one is actually worth anything: mixed together, it’s a bit like someone making a stew out of lamb, spaghetti and Mylar balloons.

If the astronaut story-line mimics the essential beats of the far-superior Moon a bit too much, at least it’s aping superior source material. This portion of the film, on its own, would actually have made a pretty interesting, modest little sci-fi flick. Wright is decent as Capt. Lee Miller, although his gradual progression into insanity doesn’t quite work and his eventual residence there, consisting of shameless mugging and eye-rolling, is pretty idiotic. Aesthetically, Love owes a lot to Kubrick’s 2001, as well as newer sci-fi films like Moon. Love’s astronaut sections exist in a very sterile, antiseptic, hospital-white environment: most of this is quite beautifully shot, particularly one gorgeous section where Miller goes to repair some equipment while encircled by lights. This scene actually reminded me (favorably) of things in 2001 and my only complaint was that it didn’t have more company. Nonetheless, the astronaut portions are definitely watchable, particularly for space fans looking for an easy fix.

However, one must also sit through the pretentious interview portions, a conceit which doesn’t even bear fruit by the film’s admittedly ambitious finale. The interviews are poorly staged, tedious and only occasionally relevant to anything that we’ve seen or heard. Only slightly more relevant, though vastly more confusing, are the Civil War segments. I never fully understood their relevance, although I have a few educated guesses. My honest opinion? I think that writer/director William Eubank’s ambition far-outweighed his ability to deliver a cohesive script. Ambition is great but an ambitious miss is still a miss, no matter how you look at it.

Ultimately, Love is a wildly ambitious but, unfortunately, rather unsuccessful film. The filmmakers have great reference points and, from what I could tell, the best of intentions. The film looks pretty good, especially in the space sections, and the finale is quite thought-provoking. On the other hand, the film is wildly fractured, due to too many disparate elements and story-lines and Gunner Wright isn’t quite up to the task of carrying the astronaut portions almost solely on his shoulders. With a tighter script and more focus, Love might have actually been able to approach the realms of a lesser Moon. As it is, however, the film feels less like a musical vanity project and more like a first-time director’s attempt to get on the board. It’s a good effort but I’m guessing that we’ll see better from Eubank in the future.