Cosmopolis
To tell the truth, I'm no film critic.
I'm a simple moviegoer, but to be more precise, not even that. I'd
never even try to become one, as I'd never get to the point of
writing professional opinion on any movie. I'd have to spend too much
time preparing from the works of the piece of art to be criticised,
the director and the actors. I'd read the adapted book, watch the
available films made by the director and the leading actors. If it
was no adaptation, I'd prepare from books of similar subject. After
all these, I'd still not present my opinion as one above all others,
as in this case, the following article is my humble, simple point of
view.
My inspiration to write this article
was that I managed to read the essay of a certain critic working at a
website operated by one of this country's largest cell phone service
provider. The essay was about a film contesting on the Cannes Film
Festival, 2012 and a film that was at the first place in the category
of the most anticipated movies on the MTV Brawl. This film is David
Cronenberg's Cosmopolis.
This article was indeed upsetting for
me, and I commented it, and another commenter put me down for being
personal. Just because I thought that the job of a critic is to do
most of the things written in the first paragraph, and I expected the
critic to do accordingly.
Yet, it was not what I received.
After all this, I feel that I wish to
tell my opinion, how I saw the film, how it affected me after two
years of anticipation.
The history began not even two, but
three years ago, when a colleague of mine handed over a DVD to me,
this was the film 'Twilight'. She noticed that it was a nice love
story with two young protagonists. By that time I'd heard a lot about
this film, but the comments had not been too shiny. The male
protagonist had a better reputation, too good for my taste:
beautiful, sexy guy etc. I watched the film, the vampire story was
not very vampire-ish, more like a mashup of Romeo and Juliet and Love
Story. The protagonist was interesting, but why the great applause? I
started excavating internet databases, in which I managed to find way
after doing some research on Colin Firth, although half a year before
I had not been able to find out, what's good in sitting in front of
the computer for long hours. Well, there's a lot good in it.
I was searching for the previous films
of the leading actor, which was no easy task, as they were all but
accessible from this part of the world. I did watch the films. I did
read the reviews. I did watch a lot of interviews with – let's name
him at last – Robert Pattinson. And he convinced me that he was a
charming, humble, clever person with a wry sense of humour. And also
he was not an uninteresting actor.
At the time, 'How to be' was my
favourite film because of the topic and the acting of Robert. The
more films I saw ('Little Ashes', 'Haunted Airman', the cut scene
from 'Vanity Fair', and two parts of 'Harry Potter', against the
revolt in my family), the more I found that this guy has something
that makes him interesting. In that time 'Remember Me' was being
shot, and I was consciously waiting for that film. Later came 'Water
for Elephant', and finally 'Cosmopolis'. For the last one, not even
Robert was the original lead actor selected.
As I had a mind for reading the books
in connection with the previous films as well, I started to look for
Cosmopolis, the book written by Don DeLillo. At first, I checked the
local bookstores. Later, I was looking in second-hand bookshops. I
risked searching in libraries, but by that time I knew that in
Hungary, I'll never find it. After all, I managed to get a copy in
English. I started reading. And I gave up. I asked my son to
translate it, the task took him a whole year. As not only his
knowledge in English, but also his use of Hungarian and his ability
to understand texts in the topic of economy and politics is slightly
above the average, he did quite a good job in creating a readable
translation. And I almost failed again, as the book was not easy to
read even in my mother tongue. It's no miracle that in the time of
its publishing, the book did not become a bestseller. One needs more
than basic knowledge in politics, economy, mathematics and
information technology. We have to admit that there are not many in
this world to have such a broad view on all these topics. But among
those, who have, the book was a success.
Someone realised that the book, written
in 2003, models the current events the world in a surprisingly
accurate way. There was a brave Portuguese producer, who found the
book worthy for adaptation. He also found the single director
extravagant enough to make the film. The director also wrote the
screenplay himself, in six days.
Until two months before I admit I'd
seen only two films of this director. These were 'Naked Lunch' and
'The Fly'. None of these were bad films, though 'Naked Lunch' could
rather be characterised as eerie.
Back to Cosmopolis.
Many people attacked Cronenberg for
casting Robert Pattinson for the role of Eric Packer instead of Colin
Farrell. He had an emotionless face, an emotionless voice, that he
was talentless – most of the male critics and several of the female
critics shared these arguments. According to the other side the actor
was not only talented, but also a handsome, or even beautiful guy. So
the critic society started making theories whether this actor could
do some acting or not, as they could not say that Cronenberg simply
got mad when casting Pattinson. Miracle or not, the money was
assembled for the film with his entry, which was not managed with
Farrell. So now? Robert Pattinson is not a good actor, but we raise
the funds to see him again as not being good? It looks a bit
contradictory to me. I would only ask, what do many think what was he
doing in the hated 'Twilight'-movies? He did not go down shopping,
but he was playing the character of Edward Cullen, most hated movie
person by men, as women will want a guy like him from now on. Kind,
educated person, who would give everything to his chosen girl, a bit
controlling, but can be convinced. So Pattinson actually suffers from
some chauvinism. Not to mention the female critics. I have to admit,
I'm no great feminist, and those, who hate Edward for some reason,
are probably feminists. Yet it's not necessary to like the character,
but after abstracting from the role model, it's quite clear that
Pattinson delivers briliant acting.
Oh my, I wasn't talking about
Cosmopolis again. Sorry.
Back to Cosmopolis, part two.
So, I prepared for the film. Read the
book, watched several Cronenberg-movies in three weeks (Ms
Butterfly, Naked Lunch, eXistenZ, Videodrome, Scanners, Eastern
Promises, History of Violence, Dangerous Method, Spider, not to
mention The Fly, that I saw a couple of years ago). And I went to
watch the film.
I must agree
with those saying that Cronenberg made a big shot with this one. As
well as all the cast. As though Pattinson is the lead actor, all the
others are no less important. This is no one-man show.
Maybe the
point is not the amount of events. This is no adventure movie. It's a
thinking movie, nevertheless, the official trailers are indeed
diversive. Still, there was no secret about the film being an
adaptation, one can get the book and read it. The point of the film
is hidden in the long dialogues in the low number of actual events –
and there is a point. If one does not find it, they did not listen.
If one writing a review on the film was tired, watched the film only
as a part of the job, did not care about it, then the point remains
hidden. But the chief of theory tells it, and the distorted quote
from Marx.
I will not
write the obvious about the film. Just a few thoughts.
It was
sensational to see that Eric Packer, seated in the middle of his
stretch limo is the centre of his world, his subordinates come before
him, and everything just looks fine. Eric sits on the high throne,
the subjects come, he makes decisions.
After a short
flash, his world begins to collapse, and this flash is the short
appearance of Benno Levin (Paul Giamatti) in the corner of Eric's
eyes, standing at a cash machine. Until then we only heard rumours of
something going wrong, but the 'wrong' stay out of the car. But after
this flash Eric gets out of control. He can be seen on different
seats of the car, eating breakfast, lunch, dinner with his newly-wed
wife, making love with his art counsellor and his bodyguard. At a
time he even makes contact with the anarchists, but he's still in
charge. Later, a doctor states that Eric has asymmetric prostates.
With this moment, the space configuration containing the 'wrong'
enters the limo, and it goes worse when Eric is informed about the
death of his rapper friend. He shoots the last stable point in his
life, his chief of security on the throat, driven by childish
curiosity. His hair is cut in an asymmetric shape by the barber he'd
known since his childhood, as Packer feels an urge to jump out of the
chair before the old man could finish the haircut. Then we see that
the eyes of his driver are also asymmetrical. Eric marches towards
his destiny, as he loses everything in the speculative attack against
the yuan, he deliberately destroys the world around him by acting on
impulse, after failing in the pre-designed plans.
In the final
twenty minutes one must listen carefully, this scene is tense, but
very rythmical, the actors draw all the attention on the events. Who
will shoot whom, and in which second? And what do they want to tell
us? What is the explanation of their deeds? As both characters,
victim and murderer try to understand himself and the other. This was
no boring scene. I watched the film twice, and didn't get bored. For
the second time, I knew exactly what was going to happen, and I
watched as intensely as before. I was astonished for the second time,
when Packer shot his bodyguard, and I was wondering if he would shoot
the barber or let him go (Eastern Promises came into my mind with the
barber shop). The process of Eric's life falling apart can be seen on
his clothing. The perfect gentleman becomes a simple guy in dirty
rags, walking into the ravaged house where his life is about to end.
Or is it? As the film does not state, what the book does. Cronenberg
was joking, about wanting to make a sequel.
Everyone
had a great part in the movie. Many told that Pattinson was a good
choice as he had a robotic face. Not at all. He plays the indifferent
yuppie with a fortune enough to buy smaller countries but with no
interest in anything. By the end of the film this state also changes.
The money manipulator becomes a man and starts to understand what
he'd been playing with in all his life – human life. This is called
acting. And not only Pattinson was good. Everyone was. Sarah Gadon
was marvellous in playing the rigid, cold, rich heir of an ancient
family, and all the others played fantastically. I was missing
the "I want to bottle-fuck you slowly with my sunglasses
on”-sentence from the scene with the medical examination. Why was
it omitted? Who was so shy?
Nothing else was missing.
It's natural, that every adaptation alters the original slightly. In
this case, nor the original story, nor the essence of it was
corrupted.
A specter is haunting the
world. The specter of capitalism. The point of capitalism is to
destroy the current world and build a new one on the ruins. This is
happening just now.
I'd give 5/5 for the film.
And I agree with the Spanish critic saying that Cosmopolis shoud have
been awarded with the Palm d'Or.
Nincsenek megjegyzések:
Megjegyzés küldése