Day: August 1, 2009

Two Lovers

This is a simple story and simple movie. We have all seen this setup before, and the opportunities for missteps and a sentimental mess are rife. But somehow, Two Lovers works. It is a love triangle with Leonard (Joaquin Phoenix) caught between the solid, careful and loving daughter of his father’s business partner, Sandra (Vinessa Shaw), and the wild, glamorous, and more than slightly nuts, Michelle (Gwyneth Paltrow). Written and directed by James Gray, the movie follows Leonard’s ambivalence towards two women that represent different futures: marry Sandra and please his parents, go to work in the dry cleaning business, be sure of someone who really loves him; or escape Brooklyn and his past with Michelle, who could explode at any minute, and whose love for him is never more than glancing.

All the performances are impressive, especially Vinessa Shaw and Leonard’s parents (played by Moni Moshonov and a wonderful Isabella Rossellini). They are small, careful performances, eschewing any violent displays of emotion. The emotion is worn on the faces of the protagonists, not in their speech. There are a few small missteps (the opening scene with an attempted suicide), but they are more than outweighed by moments of delight. At the very end of the movie Leonard suddenly switches his affections, and while one would expect it to feel artificial and forced, but it seems perfectly natural.

So the cheesy existential angst of Watchmen‘s heroes didn’t do it for you?

Big Man Japan, Hatsuhiro Matsumo’s stone-faced documentary about the lonely, tedious life of one of Japan’s last monster-fighters, is among the most cussedly determined comedic visions I’ve seen in some while. It’s not always terribly funny, it’s pacing is more long-range Tati than zippy & slapsticky, and the locus of its concerns (avoiding the larger cultural context except as implied by conversations with hero Masaru Daisato) remains frustratingly parochial. Yet–whether as antidote to Hollywood or just deadpan pop-culture remix–it is a dizzy, idiosyncratic vision.

Daisato seems to be at the tail-end of way too many bong hits, slowly and dazedly talking to his interviewers about his expanding umbrella, his daughter. He doesn’t really give answers about, and the film doesn’t really investigate, what his isolation might mean, or how to interpret his alienation. And yet he’s mostly the only talking head, his interviews stitched together around his encounters with a series of lovely huge grotesques. The movie avoids the typical mockumentary conventions, where the film’s thesis comes through its deployment of “experts” (or just a range of voices) to underline the satirical vision. I’m not even sure this is satire. It’s more like a perfect alternate/cover version of a familiar set of cultural tropes. I particularly liked the protagonist’s constant brushing of his long hair off his face, and his impotent screaming at the equally-bellicose and -deadpan Stinking Monster.