TWO BY FERRARA: NEW ROSE HOTEL & THE FUNERAL

There's a great Abel Ferrara Q&A from the 2011 New York Film Festival on YouTube that I've been listening too for the last couple of months that gives a lot of insight in to his career. Thanks mostly in part to the support of New York City's film community, Abel Ferrara has kinda "resurfaced" over the last couple of years - His last film, 4:44 Last Day On Earth, had a good run, Anthology Film Archives gave a great retrospective on his recent unseen works and his previously unreleased films are a little easier to come by online and on DVD now. But things weren't like that for him for quite some time.

Abel Ferrara feels he was somewhat blackballed in the movie industry sometime around the late 90's. Sometimes filmmakers use that black balled thing as an excuse for bad box office numbers or the inability to get a film financed but Ferrara sorta has a valid point. It’s odd that a filmmaker can go from making Bad Lieutenant (one of the best films & best lead performances of the 90's) to barely being able to getting a small indie film financed. Maybe it was his string of interesting/odd/misunderstood/frustrating post-Bad Lt. works like; Body Snatchers, Dangerous Game & The Addiction that kinda turned producers & financers off. Maybe there were some behind-the-scenes things we don’t know about. Whatever the case may be, Ferrara put out some interesting work in the late 90's that hasn’t really stood the test of time (The Funeral) or has gone virtually unknown (New Rose Hotel) at no fault of his own and in my opinion they should be revisited...

I like New Rose Hotel more than I think I'm supposed to. From the bad reviews to the low ratings on IMDB & Rotten Tomatoes - everything is telling me to hate this movie but I just can’t. There's something about this lost random gem that I really enjoy. Unlike other misunderstood maverick filmmakers who find more fans & support in Europe with their recent questionable work (Melvin Van Peeples, Alex Cox, Monte Hellman, etc) Ferrara actually has good & consistent work that just has a tough time getting distributed sometimes. His work is fun to dissect and write about even when it’s problematic.

New Rose Hotel, adapted from the William Gibson short story of the same name, is a moody, atmospheric, sensual, science fiction tale that falls under the cyberpunk genre (the film was actually given Gibson's blessing). But unlike other classic cyberpunk science fiction films, New Rose Hotel doesn’t have super robots (Robocop), cool laser guns (Bladerunner) or virtual reality (Lawnmower Man). There isn’t even a huge emphasis on computers or getting lost on the Internet which is usually what these kinda stories are about (The Matrix, World On A Wire, Hackers, etc). It’s barely science fiction. In the same vein as Cronenberg's eXistenZ, Abel Ferrara lightly hints at all the futuristic aspects of the world he creates instead of shoving flying cars & robots down our throats. Besides Bladerunner, New Rose Hotel has a much darker tone than the other films in the cyber punk genre. It takes place in darkly lit lounges, night clubs and of course...hotel rooms. These settings make sense as New Rose is just as much a neo-noir as it is a science fiction tale.
Years before this was made, a pre-Hurt Locker/Zero Dark Thirty Kathryn Bigelow was set to direct an adaptation of it before Abel Ferrara but after some creative differences between her and Gibson, she dropped out of the project and went on to make Strange Days - another cyber punk story that has a few similarities to not only New Rose Hotel, but a lot of Gibson's other stories as well...

When I talked to Gibson, I said you want to help? He said if you need me you're in bad shape. She [Bigelow] had him thinking he couldn't write a script, that he was useless. Believe me I don't know how this guy even survived that. She wanted her way. You should read the script he wrote for this if it wasn't called "New Rose Hotel." You wouldn't know what the Hell it was. Then they got rid of him, they didn't want him around anymore. Then they were going to do the version with Schwarzenegger and they put in 300K for this Creative Artists writer out of LA and were gonna write it as an action movie and get Schwarzenegger to play it. - Abel Ferrara (Indiewire)

Immediately after watching this I read Gibson's short and honestly feel that the film honors the original story. Any time you adapt someones work (especially a cultish writer like Gibson) you're always gonna get loyal literature fans complaining about something but Gibson gave this film his blessing which is good enough for me. Unfortunately, I think New Rose Hotel was stuck with the stigma that Johnny Mnemonic left behind a few years earlier (another sci-fi film adapted from a Gibson story that failed at the box office) and people didn’t wanna give it a chance. Additionally, Abel Ferrara isn’t exactly the first filmmaker who comes to mind when you think of science fiction. Maybe people just weren't ready for an Abel Ferrara science fiction movie. He isn’t from the same school as Paul Verhoven, The Wachowski's, David Cronenberg but with New Rose Hotel he didn’t try to be a someone he's not. He brought William Gibson in to HIS world and brought along a few of his regulars (Christopher Waken, Willem Dafoe & Asia Argento)

In the not-too-distant future, the world's two biggest corporations (Maas & Hosaka) are feuding with one another for control over the best patents, cures and other worldly inventions. The brightest mind behind many of these genius developments, a scientist by the name of "Hiroshi", is currently employed by the Maas corporation and Hosaka is looking to steal to him away. This is where "Fox" (Christopher Walken) and his partner "X" (Willem Dafoe) come in to play. Fox & X are "headhunters" whose job is to essentially convince/persuade workers to go from one company to another. If Fox & X can get Hiroshi to come over to the Hosaka corporation they'll be paid $100 Million. To persuade Hiroshi to switch employers, Fox & X hire an Italian prostitute ("Sandii") to seduce him. This is the basic plot. After that it’s a bit difficult to follow. X falls in love with Sandii, Fox becomes fascinated with Hiroshi, there's a huge plague, Fox throws an orgy and a good portion of what we see in the first half of the film is played out again as slightly altered flashbacks towards the end. The dialogue is a bit up its own ass at times (hey, I like this movie very much but its true). Much of the script (especially the lines delivered by Christopher Walken) seems more concerned with sounding smart, existential, cool & scientific instead of making any sense. The basic plot is pretty easy to decipher but you may find yourself questioning if what a lot of Walken & Dafoe are talking about really has anything to do with the film.

Certain themes and the overall style of New Rose Hotel went on to influence Ferrara's later work like Mary (2005) & 4:44 (2011). In New Rose Hotel we see a lot of chaotic editing (which we hadn’t really seen in Ferrara's films up to that point) and the use of mixed media and different types of cameras all in the same film (some of the footage is grainy, reminiscent of Wong Kar Wai's Fallen Angels, while most of the footage looks like a normal movie). This type of filmmaking is all done throughout Mary. Many themes in New Rose Hotel like plagues and the end of the world are the basis for 4:44. Ferrara even tips his hat to Kubrick (the hotel room that Dafoe stays in towards the end of the film looks like the room at the end of 2001). I can see how some of the acting in the film could be a little off putting. Christopher Walken is more quirky & strange than usual to the point where you find yourself laughing more at how he pronounces certain words instead of focusing on the overall performance which can be pretty distracting. The performance and look of Fox is very similar to the character he plays in Donald Cammell's Wild Side. But hey, some people who love Walken's quirkiness may get a kick out of his portrayal of Fox. Asia Argento, who's never been more beautiful, is a little flat & awkward at times (although I've heard some describe her performance in New Rose Hotel as "raw") but you find yourself not really caring too much because of how naturally beautiful she looks. Dafoe's presence is kinda downplayed in my opinion but Ferrara made up for that with Go-Go Tales.

On a more positive note, New Rose Hotel features cameos and quick appearances from the likes of John Lurie, Anabella Sciorra & Victor Argo

Ferrara has an understanding & love for cinema that many directors don’t which is a shame because his reputation among the average person aware of who he is keeps him in that King Of New York/Ms. 45/Bad Lieutenant box when he's got a lot more to give (he’s currently working on a script about the final day of Pier Paolo Passolini). Ever since Bad Lieutenant it seems like he's been trying to stretch himself more as a filmmaker and dip in to different genres like the apocalypse (4:44), science fiction/"the information age" (New Rose Hotel) and hybrid fiction/documentaries (Hotel Chelsea) yet people (mostly Americans) aren't very receptive for some reason. New Rose Hotel has a lot in common with Vinterberg's It’s All About Love. Both films are beautiful chaotic messes that have great casts, cover many issues and are set in an odd disorienting vision of the not-so-distant future.

If you go in to New Rose Hotel expecting Ferrara's regular raw, gritty New York City style of filmmaking found in Bad Lieutenant or Ms. 45 you're setting yourself up to be disappointed. If you have an open mind and are looking to expand your view on him as a filmmaker (which New Rose Hotel will surely do) this may be the film for you.

Now...if you're looking for vintage Abel Ferrara then look no further than his 1996 mob drama; The Funeral...

I'm not very keen on writing about mob movies. Everything has already been written about the great ones by people more qualified than I (Godfather, Mean Streets, Goodfellas, etc) and all the other mob movies out there are just bad, formulaic carbon copies of the great ones that aren't really worthy of being written about (too many to name). That’s the interesting thing about the mob genre - there’s not much middle ground. Mafia films are either classic pieces of art or bad & overrated. There aren’t too many that are just simply "good" or "solid". Abel Ferrara's The Funeral may not be on the same level as The Godfather or Goodfellas but it shouldn't be grouped in with all the other bad & overrated mob films out there. The Funeral is pretty unique. Besides the mafia/organized crime angle it touches on family (blood family, not mafia family) along with communism & socialism. Ferrara inst a novice to the mob/organized crime genre (King Of New York & China Girl) but this is by far his best work within that realm. In my opinion this was his last undeniably good film for quite some time until he re-emerged with Mary (2005) & Go-Go Tales (2007). According to co-star Vincent Gallo, Abel Ferrara spent a good portion of his time on set in his trailer smoking crack instead of directing but I find that a little hard to believe.

This film was pretty much considered a flop in the U.S. (like most post-Bad Lieutenant Ferrara films) when it came out and I honestly don’t get it. Over the years it’s become one of those movies you find in the discount DVD bin section at the video store for $7.99 (that's how I came across it). How is it possible that a film with one of the greatest ensemble casts of the last 20 years (Christopher Walken, Chris Penn, Benecio Del Toro, Vincent Gallo, Annabella Sciorra, Isabella Rossellini, the underrated Victor Argo and a quick appearance from David Patrick Kelly) managed to fall in to obscurity? More importantly, in an era when large ensemble casts were pretty much only used for those multi-storyline post-Pulp Fiction style films in American independent cinema, Ferrara didn't fall in to that madness and made ONE cohesive story as opposed to 6 different stories that all connect to each other in the end. The Funeral is different from other mob films as there's minimal violence (when compared to stuff like Goodfellas or King Of New York). Its more about the internal family problems between two brothers: "Ray" (Christopher Walken) & "Chez" (Chris Penn) and how they handle (and ultimately deal with) the death of their youngest (communist) brother "Johnny" (Vincent Gallo) who was gunned down by a rival crime family run by "Gaspare Spoglia" (Benecio Del Toro)...or at least that's what we're supposed to believe.

The Funeral is without a doubt Chris Penn's greatest performance. Take his intensity from the final minutes of Reservoir Dogs and spread it out through an entire movie and you'd kinda get the gist of what I'm talking about. His performance is so draining & heavy it almost gives you a headache watching him act. Most performances concerned with depression (which Chez is surely suffering from) focuses more on the sad & crippling aspect of it while Penn's performance focuses more on the angry & aggressive side of depression. And Chris Penn's large size adds to it, giving the Chez character an intimidating presence. There’s one scene in particular that’s a bit odd & hard to watch where he has his way with a young girl. Say what you want about the cinema of Abel Ferrara, and trust me there's plenty to say both good & bad, but he can get an intense performance out of his actors - Harvey Keitel in Bad Lieutenant, Forest Whitaker in Mary, Willem Dafoe in Go-Go Tales, etc. This was also one of Christopher Walken's later rare good performances along with Catch Me If You Can (a performance he was nominated for that still manages to go unnoticed).

It's tough to take Walken seriously in his more recent work but there's no misguided humor about his performance in The Funeral (especially in the scene when he confronts the man who killed his brother). Ray & Chez are both big tough gangsters but when they confront each other they revert back to being little kids - in a scene towards the beginning Walken leaves the house when Penn arrives and refuses to come back until he leaves (clearly something a child would do). Penn & Walken's grieving in The Funeral makes me miss the brother I never even had. The presence of the female characters (Sciorra, Rossellini & Mol play the "mob wives") may come off as minor at first but in one scene Anabella Sciorra kinda steals the show with a monologue about how sick & fed up she is with the mob way of life and her husband. Unlike classic female performances in gangster films (Diane Keaton in The Godfather or Lorraine Braco in Goodfellas) Sciorra comes off a lot tougher and less neurotic (although still a bit vulnerable & sad).
My only complaint about The Funeral is the lack of Isabella Rossellini. Also, there’s just “something” about The Funeral that was screaming for Michael Madsen’s presence. Given the size of the cast, The Funeral could have easily been a 2-1/2+ hour film if done right but at the same time its fine the way it is. There’s something about a 90-something minute mafia film that’s a breath of a fresh air in a sea of 3+ hour epics.

I find myself kinda sympathizing for some of the characters in The Funeral more than I do in other mob films. There's no celebration of the crimes they commit or the flashy violent lifestyle they live whereas in stuff like Goodfellas we're kinda supposed to think these guys are "cool" (Goodfellas is still one of the most important films of the 90's and there would probably be no Funeral without it). At the end of the day The Funeral could be looked at as a film that shows the realistic & ugly side of mob life and the consequences that come with that lifestyle. The Funeral is more along the lines of Donnie Brasco (specifically Al Pacino's character) or the mob sub plot in Ghost Dog where we see old, broken down, tired gangsters in their 50's & 60's still carrying out hits, taking orders and hanging out in smoke-filled basements (nothing really "cool" about that). This is a quietly depressing & drab film with an ending that takes the phrase(*SPOILER ALERT*): "everyone dies in the end" a little too literal. The lighting is always dark and all the dominant colors in the film are darkish & grey and you genuinely feel bad for Vincent Gallo as he lies on the ground whimpering (literally) and dying from a gunshot to the belly. The Funeral features plenty of "Ferrara-isms" - religious symbolism (specifically Catholicism), the focus on Italian American families, Christopher Walken & Victor Argo and occasional spurts of violence). For reasons ranging from rawness & grittiness to unconventional editing & storytelling, Ferrara can be an acquired taste for some (he’s one of those American filmmakers who’s appreciated more by Europeans than fellow Americans). If you’ve read my write-ups on Mary & Go-Go Tales you’d see that the cinema of Abel Ferrara is quite challenging, but he’s currently one of my favorite filmmakers to write about (along with Terrence Malick & Carlos Reygadas).

The Funeral can be enjoyed by most people (cinephiles to average movie goers who like a gangster film). Some may be a little let down by the final act as well as the discovery of who actually killed Vincent Gallo, but I personally didn't have any problems with it. Ferrara could have taken a more conventional route to ending his film and he didn't.

SEX, LIES & ANSWERING MACHINES: ATOM EGOYAN'S CALENDAR

I like to think that PINNLAND EMPIRE has always been a friendly place for Canadian filmmakers. From modern legends (David Cronenberg) to cult figures (Guy Maddin) to young emerging talent (Xavier Dolan) and everything else in between - there's always been a special place on this site for our friends in the north. But the one Canadian figure we almost never mention on here is Atom Egoyan. I'm almost embarrassed to admit but outside of The Sweet Hereafter, Adoration & Chloe I'm not very familiar with his work (I haven't even seen Exotica). I came across Calendar by a fluke (it was recommended to me on Netflix instant) and fell in love with it instantly. Without calling Atom Egoyan a copycat, this was like his version of Soderbergh’s Sex, Lies & Videotape - men dealing with heartbreak in an internally self destructive way, a realistic look at the deterioration of a marriage (due mostly in part to infidelity) and eroticism without the use of nudity, raunchiness or any kind of sex scene.

Calendar is also quite experimental. In a video essay on Clean, Shaven, Michael Attikson described Lodge Kerrigan’s debut as; an unorthodox, narritively uncooperative movie. An almost experimental feature in a sea of conventional indies from the mid-90's
The same exact thing could easily be said about Calendar - It's told out of order, the two main characters aren’t credited with any actual names for the viewer to reference them by (the lead characters are billed as: "Photographer" & "Interpreter" in the credits) and even though English is the primary language in the film, Egoyan intentionally does away with subtitles whenever Armenian is spoken which adds to the isolation & disconnect we're supposed to feel for the main character. Calendar also uses audio/voiceover in the same playful/experimental way as Kerrigan's Clean, Shaven by mix-matching audio & video to give off a disorienting vibe (a technique that was used in later films like Harmony Korine's Julien Donkey-Boy, which is heavily influenced by Clean, Shaven)

I do know enough about the cinema of Atom Egoyan to know that communication & voyeurism through various forms of technology (email, texting, video cameras, webcams, cell phones, etc) is a common theme in his work. These days technology makes it easier for humans to avoid contact with other humans as much as possible. Today we live in a world where couples break up through texts, over webcams or over the phone but 20+ plus years ago (when Calendar was made) you kinda had to face your soon-to-be ex lover and break up with them in person. Calendar, Egoyan's quietly excellent film about a couple who always communicates with some kind of a device or piece of equipment between them (a video camera, phone or an answering machine) was somewhat ahead of its time (made in 1993) as part of the film deals with a divorced couple trying to get some type of closure over the phone instead of in person.

Vouyerism: The Cinema of Atom Egoyan...

Calendar has a strong spiritual connection to Olivier Assayas' Irma Vep (1996). In Assayas' 1996 feature there's a scene where Maggie Cheung sneaks in to the hotel room of a naked woman, played by Calendar co-star; Arsinee Khanjian, as a ways to get in to character for a role she’s playing in a film (a cat burglar). Cheung proceeds to spy on a buck naked Khanjian as she fuses at her significant other over the phone. It's clear she was horny and expecting to have sex but has been stood up. Khanjian's ranting over the phone about her disappointments in the relationship she’s in echo that of the earlier role she played in Calendar (directed by her real life husband). A huge chunk of Calendar features Arsinee Khanjian's character leaving her ex-husband (played by her real life husband; Atom Egoyan) voice messages about her disappointment in how their marriage ended (she cheats on him) in the same irritated yet sad tone of voice that she uses on the phone in Irma Vep.

Calendar can’t really be boxed in to one genre - Egoyan mixes the personal/stream of conscious/diary-like style of Jonas Mekas mixed with the style of a traditional Ang Lee drama about a marriage on the rocks. It’s fictional yet at the same time it’s obviously semi-autobiographical. This was clearly an incomplete thought or dream that was expanded in to a feature length "cut-up style" film.

Calendar, of course, was a lot more personal. There was a defining structure, but a lot of it was improvised, and it was a little dream project for me - Atom Egoyan (AV Club)

In Calendar, Egoyan & Khanjian play a husband & wife team who travel to Armenia to take photographs of old churches (Egoyan is the photographer while Khanjian serves as his collaborator/bi-lingual translator). The photos they take are to be used for a church-themed Calender. They’re escorted around the city by a personal driver named "Ashot" (the only character in the film with a name) and Egoyan starts to suspect that Ashot and his wife are developing feelings for each other. We come to find out that she eventually does cheat on him and they separate. To cope with the separation, Egoyan's character uses an escort agency to screen/interview various women to be his next mate. Part of the screening process involves him getting the women to leave him dirty/sexy voice messages so he can listen back to them. This is very reminiscent of James Spader's character in Sex, Lies & Videotape (he videotapes random women talking about sex in order to "get off"). 

The (nameless) main character that Egoyan plays in Calendar has the characteristics of three outta the four main characters in Sex, Lies & Videotape - the stereotypical uncaring husband played by Peter Gallagher, the vulnerable & insecure spouse played by Andie McDowell and the strangely perverse yet heartbroken loner played by James Spader.

Sex, Lies & Videotape (1989)

Atom Egoyan uses a lot of quietly slick filming techniques in order to convey the lack of communication and chemistry between the married couple. The cinematography in this film acts as a mirror for their relationship. At no point do we see Egoyan & Khanjian on screen together at the same time. The camera that Egoyan uses in the film, which is always placed in between them, is like a wall, or obstacle, in their marriage. This is a similar technique used in The Spirit Of The Beehive. At no point in Beehive do we ever see Anna's mother & father together on screen in the same frame (it should also be noted that Anna's mother is unfaithful to her husband too).

Calendar is like a play on the phrase "Eyes Wide Shut". You have a photographer with a failing marriage and a wife making a connection with another man right in front of him yet he does nothing about it and allows himself to be eaten up by jealousy.

Was Calendar made as a way for Egoyan and Khanjian to work out some real life marital issues they may have been having at the time? Did he ever really suspect that his wife was falling out of love with him? This is one of those films that makes you speculate those kinds of things. I’m amazed that 20 years after this was made Egoyan & Khanjian are still together. From Godard/Karina (Made In The U.S.A.) & Cruise/Kidman (Eyes Wide Shut) to Cameron/Bigelow (Strange Days) & Lynch/Patrician Norris (Inland Empire) we've all seen quite a few real life relationships between actors & filmmakers fall apart following some kind of collaboration in front of or behind the camera. Obviously there are exceptions to this besides Egoyan & Khanjian (Cassavetes & Rowlands) but generally speaking, film collaborations between significant others can often push things to the breaking point in real life. 

Olivier Assayas & Maggie Cheung fell in love during the making of Irma Vep only to divorce 8 years later prior to finishing their 2nd collaboration; Clean (apparently they signed the divorce papers on set).

The same year Irma Vep was released, Steven Soderbergh re-emerged after a series of "flops" where he, like Assayas, directed, and co-starred with, his ex-wife (Betsy Brantley) in a film that partially deals with infidelity and the lack of communication in a marriage (Schizopolis).

Atom Egoyan (Right) in Calendar

Much has already been said in other reviews about the cultural/ethnic aspect of Calendar - The film is set in Atom Egoyan's motherland (Armenia) and it deals with the disconnect he has being there (he feels isolated and left out whenever his wife & Ashot casually speak Armenian around him because he doesn't know what they're saying). But I'm honestly more intrigued by Egoyan's focus on the insecurity of man. It takes a lot, especially for a man, to share the kinds of insecurities that many of us have. In film, women are generally portrayed as overly complicated, unreasonable, crying, psycho & childish when it comes to relationships. EVERYTHING makes them jealous and there's always the threat of them being cheated on. With men its usually simple - they suspect their significant other of being unfaithful and they resort to explosive violence. It's as if all men are incapable of complex feelings within a relationship or dont know how to deal with being cheated on without being violent. Calendar dispels that myth and shows a more complicated side of the stereotypical jealous insecure male partially thanks to the path James Spader helped make with his performance in Sex, Lies & Videotape. That performance was eventually "one-uped" by Danny Huston in the criminally underrated/barely seen Kruetzer Sonata (2008). Some credit is even due to Tom Cruise for his performance in Eyes Wide Shut. No matter how problematic Kubrick's final film was, that scene of Cruise in the back of the taxi after Nicole Kidman admitted that she almost cheated on him (used in my review of Only God Forgives) is pretty powerful.

Sex, Lies & Videotape (1989) / Kreutzer Sonata (2008)

It goes without saying that experimental cinema like Calendar isn't for everyone (especially in feature length form) but at the same time it branches out to so many other films & filmmakers that there's a good chance it's bound to be enjoyed by even the average movie watcher not familiar with Atom Egoyan (Calendar maintains a 100% rating on rotten tomatoes).

AN INTERVIEW WITH ALICE HOURI

Not many actresses or actors take their fans out to old school hip-hop parties, mail them rare French movies or invite them in to their home for dinner but that’s what sets Alice Houri apart from everybody else. I recently caught up with her (via email) to discuss last years' The Rabbi's Cat (an animated film that she lent her voice to), Claire Denis' latest, the importance of short films and Americas growing appreciation for (good) French cinema.

Enjoy...

PINNLAND EMPIRE: What was it like doing voiceover for The Rabbi’s Cat? That was your first time working on an animated film, right?

ALICE HOURI: Yes it was my first time working on an animated film and I really enjoyed it. It was a famous comic book before becoming a cartoon. It was full of humor (Jewish humor!) so I was honored to participate in the movie.

PE: Do you see yourself doing more voiceover/cartoons in the future?

AH: I would love to do more.

PE: Are cartoons/animated films becoming more popular within French art house & indie cinema?

AH: I don't really know if animated films are becoming more popular in France (The Rabbi's Cat, the book, was already famous in France). What I know is these kinds of films are expensive to make so for the art house/independent cinema, money is the main problem...

The Rabbi's Cat (2011)

PE: I still have not seen Face La Mere (there’s only one small clip on the Internet). Can you tell us what it’s about?

AH: Face La Mere is a short film about fisherman. We shot it in Sete - a little town in the south that use to be a big fishing port, but not anymore. The profession is dying. It’s really hard to keep the independent way. Sete is now becoming a touristic place and the fishermen have to fight hard to survive...it's sad.

PE: In the last couple of years you’ve acted in a few short films - Do you think short films are a way to work out techniques & ideas for future full length films or do you feel some stories just don’t need to be that long?

AH: Short films are, traditionally in France, a way to access long movies. Like a visit card. So on one hand it's a way to work out techniques and ideas. A way to develop your own universe. And on the other hand, it's hard to tell a story in a short time frame. That's the difficulty of the exercise.

US Go Home (1994)

PE: It seems that films about youth & "coming of age" are more common in French cinema than anywhere else (400 blows, Small Change, Murmur Of The Heart, Au Revoir Les Enfants, Zazie Dans La Metro, A nos Amours, US Go Home, Something In The Air, etc). 

You’ve acted in a few films on that subject yourself (US Go Home, Nenette & Boni, Du Poil Sous Les Roses). Why do you think that is in French cinema?

AH: Well I don't think films about youth and growing up are a French specialty. The subject is universal: Dakota Fanning, Shirley Temple, Macaulay Culkin, Drew Barrymore, etc. The Kid by Chaplin is my favorite. It’s the most poetical look at the topic of childhood

PE: French-based films are starting to become more popular over here in America (Amour, Holy Motors, Carlos, etc). Is this a surprise to some French people? How does it make you feel?

AH: It’s kind of a surprise and maybe there's a sense of pride for some French people to see that some movies have succeeded in America. You know, here, we humbly call this industry "the French exception". I think your country is amazing because you have a long tradition of cinephilia and films like Holy Motors find a larger public there than in France. But at the same time a movie like La Vie En Rose was a huge success (and it's not the same public at all). Woody Allen says he's more famous in France than in his own country. To be recognized here first you have to find the glory in America.

Holy Motors - Leos Carax (2012)

PE: You’re a cinephile so I know you saw a bunch of movies in 2012. What were your favorite films from last year?

AH: The best film I’ve seen lately is Tey made by Alain Gomis. So poetic. I loved it!

PE: What films are you looking forward to watching this year?

AH: I don't know - The next Djinn Carrenard, Kechiche, Claire Denis, Farhadi…

Blue Is The Warmest Color - Kechiche (2013)

PE: Speaking of the new Claire Denis - what was it like working with her again, even if it was a small part?

AH: I was touched to work with Claire (last time I was 15). It was kind of nostalgic. But my little scene in Les Salauds was cut at the end! I'm very curious to see this next opus! It will be done on Saturday...



PE: Now that Vincent Lindon has made two films with Claire Denis is he considered part of the "family"?

AH: Yep I think Vincent Lindon is for sure part of the family. They seem to love and respect each other really deeply



PE: In the future do you ever see yourself moving away from acting completely to become a director or would you like to do both?


AH: I would like to work as a director, actress or scenarist…

LEVIATHAN VS. PACIFIC RIM: AN UNLIKELY COMPARISON

Leviathan / Pacific Rim

As I sat watching Pacific Rim, feeling partially numb as I just learned of the George Zimmerman verdict less than an hour earlier, I was strangely reminded of Leviathan (2012) - the experimental indie documentary about the fishing industry and the dangers of being a fisherman. In Pacific Rim, a 3D science fiction/Godzilla homage about giant military robots (controlled by humans) that fight off equally sized monsters from destroying planet earth, we see quite a few battles between the robots (the good guys) and the giant monsters (the bad guys) that take place in the middle of the ocean. These battles in Pacific Rim, enhanced by the 3D factor, reminded me of the feeling I got when I first saw Leviathan where I felt like I was right there on the boat with the other fishermen in the middle of the ocean risking my life to reel in net-fulls of fish.

Without getting too abstract, it’s pretty obvious that both; Pacific Rim & Leviathan are slight reworkings of the age-old tale of "man vs. nature". In Leviathan, the man (the fishermen) vs. nature (the dangerous environment around them) aspect is pretty obvious while in Pacific Rim it isn't that obvious right away. The giant creatures (or Leviathans) that terrorize the planet in Pacific Rim are believed to be aliens transported from another dimension but at one point in the film its hinted that the creatures could be evolved deformed beings from all the years of pollution and toxins found in the sea (the creatures always come out of the water before they attack a city). Water is obviously an important factor in both films. So while the robots in Pacific Rim represent man (they're operated by humans) the giant monsters represent nature being that they're a product of water.

I wanted the movie (Pacific Rim) to be about humanity, about how we have to learn to trust one another because in the end the only thing that will save the world is the world, nothing and no one is going to come and save us. The idea is that we are all inside the same robots – Guillermo Del Torro

Although I personally believe there’s a lil' bit of B.S. in that quote, at least Guillermo Del Torro put SOME thought in to the story

Leviathan & Pacific Rim have quite a bit in common. Although each film caters to a different audience, I'm still surprised no one has made the connection (they were both major releases within their respective markets this year). Each film is shot utilizing some of the latest technology in filmmaking. As I already mentioned - Pacific Rim is shot in 3D for IMAX while Leviathan is shot with a bunch of small digital water proof cameras (strapped to the fishermen) in order to get as close to the action as possible (I'm sure this technique has been done before in film but it seems like Leviathan is one of the first to gain some real notoriety). Although indie & art house cinema has dipped in to the 3D realm with recent stuff like Pina & The Cave Of Forgotten Dreams (both films coincidentally made by German directors from an older generation), 3D is still more of a staple within modern studio/big budget cinema whereas digital filmmaking is more commonly associated with independent filmmaking. That's not too say that damn near all studio films today aren’t shot digitally, but with the exception of Michael Mann (and probably a few more studio directors I'm forgetting) indie/art house filmmakers were the first to really utilize and embrace digital filmmaking because of its accessibility (Bernard Rose, Spike Lee, Hal Hartley, etc). When you think of indie cinema you subconsciously imagine a guerrilla filmmaker running around with a small camera shooting from the hip.

Leviathan (1989)

Another interesting connection between these two works, besides water and the ocean, is that if you were to take all the elements from Pacific Rim and all the elements from Leviathan (2012) and mix them together in a blender you'd end up with the 1989 Peter Weller/Ernie Hudson sci-fi epic also named Leviathan (the movie some of you probably thought I was comparing Pacific Rim to when you read the title of this entry)

I don’t mean to turn this write-up in to a cliché David vs. Goliath/indie cinema vs. big budget studio cinema thing. Drawing a parallel between these two movies may even seem pointless to some of you. To compare the budgets alone between Pacific Rim (almost $200 million) & Leviathan ($43,000) is pretty fucking laughable. But in my opinion Leviathan managed to do what Pacific Rim really couldn’t fully accomplish (at a FRACTION of the budget) which was to make the audience feel like they're right in the middle of the action. And Leviathan managed to do this without the use of 3D or special Christopher Nolan IMAX cameras. Yes, Leviathan is a documentary film but it’s also, if you'll allow me to reach just a little bit, an action/adventure film - lives are at risk, there's danger around every corner, harsh weather, man versus mother nature, etc. This is the kind of film that would make Werner Herzog jealous (you could even go so far as to say that there are traces of Aguirre: The Wrath of God and Incident At Lochness in Leviathan). Just the basic set-up of Leviathan alone sounds like a John Carpenter movie from the 80's; a group of fisherman stuck together on a boat in harsh weather conditions.

There was A lot of physical pain. Being crushed by the magnitude of nature, entangled in it. Feeling fully alive and an inch away from death – Verena Paravel (co-director of Leviathan)

Leviathan / Pacific Rim

Not since The Perfect Storm and that half hour in Forest Gump has there been a film that shows the dangers of being a fisherman at sea. But the difference here with Leviathan is that it's very real. I still don't consider it to be this perfect ground breaking film that everyone is making it out to be but it was an honest attempt at trying to do something new in film and possibly push the art forward. And although Pacific Rim was really bad, I imagine Guillermo Del Torro also set out to make a boundary pushing film in terms of special effects. I put an emphasis on special effects as opposed to overall cinema being that the script/dialogue in Pacific Rim is pretty awful. Del Torro's latest is quite a paradox at times. Putting the special effects and technology aside, this movie managed to be the simplest yet most complicated story ever. On one hand the film deals with parallel universes and mind melding while the script has some of the most simplistic dialogue ever. It’s the type of dialogue found in a script written by a 16 year old boy who still plays with action figures. I also don't know if I'm supposed to take Pacific Rim completely seriously or not. Is the campiness intentional, in the vein of Paul Verhoven (Starship Troopers, Robocop,etc) or does Del Torro honestly just not get it and thinks people will take all the ridiculously corny moments in Pacific Rim seriously?

Sensory overload is another huge issue with Pacific Rim. I felt like an old man while watching it. The movie was too loud, I didn’t know what was going on half the time, the camera work was a little too chaotic and overall it was just too much. Watching Pacific Rim felt like listening to the audio of a trash compactor half the time (the numbness I was feeling from hearing George Zimmerman being found not guilty was soon replaced with a mild headache thanks to Pacific Rim).

Leviathan / Pacific Rim

Leviathan is also a Paradox. I honestly didn’t see what the big deal was the first time I saw it. Actually I was a bit disappointed. I remember thinking; "THIS was the great film that everyone has been praising so highly?!" Not to say that it was bad or anything but the way everyone was talking about it (with the exception of Chris Funderberg) made me feel like Leviathan was gonna be a game changer. I've now come to the realization that Leviathan is a pretty important modern film in terms of both; filmmaking & storytelling, yet it’s still slightly overrated. 

This is the closest thing to a 3D movie without actually using 3D technology. Putting a conch up to your ear is one thing but because of the up close & personal filmmaking style in Leviathan you really get the ripples & crunching of the waves, the blowing of the wind and even the sound of the knife used to gut the fish plugged directly in to your ears. But on the other hand, Leviathan is very boring at times. Yes some parts of the film straddle the line between being hypnotic and boring, but other parts are just undeniably boring to the point where it almost puts you to sleep (ironically, one of the most memorable scenes in Leviathan is an uninterrupted straight-on shot of a fisherman watching a fishing reality show, nodding off, fighting sleep).

Pacific Rim was one of the most anticipated films of this year but in all reality it's just a SYFY channel movie with an amazing budget. I understand movie dialogue is becoming a lot simpler in film in order to cross over in to other countries and appeal to more people but the script to Pacific Rim would seriously have you believe this was the first time Guillermo Del Torro picked up a pen to write a script. Simple is one thing, but Del Torro kinda insulted the audience’s intelligence in some parts. However, he does give the audience credit in other areas making Pacific Rim the paradox that I dubbed it earlier.

If anything, Leviathan serves as proof that indie and/or art house cinema can appeal to anyone and it isn’t always artsy, elitist or strange. Think about it - with all the sensationalized outdoorsy reality shows on television today, how could Leviathan not be enjoyed by the average non-cinephile/movie nerd? Leviathan's only downfall is that there's absolutely NO direct dialogue or voice-over narration in the film. This doesn’t bother me, although it doesn’t exactly help how boring the film can be at times, but to people not up on experimental/non-traditional cinema, this aspect could be very off-putting. And Leviathan still has a strong connection to art house cinema and doesn't alienate the crowd it was initially made for - art house heavyweight; Claire Denis was the first person to view a rough cut of the film and give criticism on it (I wouldn’t be surprised if Verena Paraval & Lucien Taylor were subconsciously inspired by Denis’ L’Intrus) and Leviathan also draws many similarities to Godard’s Film Socialisme.
But even with all of their flaws, films like Pacific Rim & Leviathan are needed to balance each other out (especially for a guy like me who is more prone to watch serious depressing art house stuff).

ONLY GOD FORGIVES: MISUNDERSTOOD MASTERPIECE

If Drive is like cocaine...then this is like really good acid - Nicolas Winding Refn (Brooklyn Academy Of Music, 2013)

Jackie Brown. Trouble Every Day. Dogville. The Brown Bunny. Inland Empire. These are all GREAT modern films (in my opinion) that were initially hated, dismissed, misunderstood and/or underrated partially due to the fact that they came after such popular & highly acclaimed works that were intimidating acts to follow (Pulp Fiction, Beau Travail, Dancer In The Dark, Buffalo 66 & Mulholland Drive, respectively). Only God Forgives will probably see the same fate but the difference here is that it will probably remain hated & misunderstood for a long time.
Normally I hate movie reviews that constantly reference the filmmaker's previous work over and over but its kinda difficult not too with this one. Drive & Only God Forgives exist in the same violent, synthesized, neon-lit, redish tinted, criminal underworld. I honestly loved this movie very much but I don’t see people instantly falling in love with it like they did with Drive (sure Drive had it's detractors but generally speaking that movie is loved a lot more than its hated). 

On more than one occasion at the screening last night there were moments in Only God Forgives when the audience would laugh at a scene that was CLEARLY supposed to be taken seriously so that should tell you guys something...

While Drive was directly influenced by the styles of Michael Mann, Martin Scorsese & Takeshi Kitano (all filmmakers who have more than a few strong similarities & connections between each other) Nicolas Winding Refn's latest film draws inspiration from sources that don’t exactly go together. Only God Forgives is a cross between the world of Stanley Kubrick (the polarizing hallway shots, people staring intensely at stuff, bold colors & odd moments of silence) and the world of straight to VHS/late night cable action movies from the early 90's that usually featured; Jeanne Claude Van Damme, Dolph Lundgren, a pre-Crow Brandon Lee, Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa or some combination of those four actors (the plot, the overuse of slow-motion, the kickboxing/martial arts angle, the lone white guy in Asia, etc). Personally, I think what Refn did here was great. I grew up on those bad action/martial arts films as a kid and today I love cinema that falls under the "art house" label so the combination of these two cinematic worlds is pretty awesome to me. But my perspective and taste is unique. Most people don’t place Stanley Kubrick & Dolph Lundgren on the same pedestal like I do so they're gonna have a tough time getting through Only God Forgives.

Only God Forgives - Refn (L), The Shining - Kubrick (R)
Stanley Kubrick isn't the first & only filmmaker to shoot hallways in such an intriguing way but I think you all get the point I'm trying to drive home in the images above. Nicolas Winding Refn even used Eyes Wide Shut Cinematographer; Larry Smith for Only God Forgives (Smith also shot Fear X & Bronson). 

That glossy/high art/sleek Michael Mann influence that I love so much is still evident in this. Only God Forgives is darkly lit & gritty yet at the same time smooth & sleek just like Thief, Manhunter & Collateral. The way Michael Mann shoots bars & night clubs in Miami Vice, Collateral & Heat is seen in Only God Forgives as well. Refn kinda blurs that line between "good guy"/the cop & "bad guy"/the criminal just like Mann usually does in his work - The relationship between Ryan Gosling/"The Criminal" & Vathaya Panssringarm/"The Cop" in Only God Forgives is pretty similar to the relationships between Deniro & Pacino in Heat or Johnny Depp & Christian Bale in Public Enemies. There's this strange fascination/respect between the criminal and the law. All throughout Only God Forgives Ryan Gosling looks at his nemesis ("Chang") with curiosity, fear & intrigue.

Nicolas Winding Refn also draws upon those little moments that often go unnoticed in Michael Mann's work. In Miami Vice there's a brief moment when Crocket/Collin Farell stares off in to the sea when he should be paying attention to the interrogation his fellow cops are giving to an informant...

Miami Vice - Mann (2006)

There's tons of moments like that in Only God Forgives where Gosling is staring off at something with this blank intensity which can be traced right back to Kubrick as he's the king of that intense stare shot...

Only God Forgives - Refn (L), Eyes Wide Shut - Kubrick (M), Manhunter - Mann (R)

There's also an obvious touch of Gaspar Noe (another filmmaker heavily influenced by Kubrick, yet closer to Refn's generation) in Only God Forgives from the opening credits to the violence we see all throughout the film (Gaspar Noe actually helped on the production of this movie for a few days and is listed in the credits). If Only God Forgives doesn't exist in the same universe as Drive, Collateral or Eyes Wide Shut, it definitely exists in the same universe as Noe's Enter The Void in terms of dreaminess and atmosphere.
But Kubrick, Mann and Noe aside - this is still very much a Nicolas Winding Refn film: Random violent outbursts, awkwardly quiet yet viscous antihero main characters, a synthesized film score and extremely slow moments. Refn even reused a lot of shots found in his older films within Only God Forgives...

Only God Forgives / Pusher 2

Only God Forgives / Pusher

Only God Forgives / Bronson

 

If you're like me and followed Nicolas Winding Refn's career prior to Drive you'd know that instant success is something pretty foreign to him, outside of the Pusher trilogy, so it isn't surprising that Only God Forgives has been getting negative reviews. This new film fits right in with just about all of Refn's pre-Drive/post-Pusher work - Fear X (2003) caused Refn to go bankrupt and forced him to make a film he didn’t really wanna make (Pusher 2) just to get out of debt. Valhalla Rising (2009) was falsely advertised as some kind of gladiator/fighting movie when in fact it was a slow, trippy, atmospheric art film which didn’t sit too well with a lot of movie goers who were expecting something else (although the film does maintain a small cult following that I am very much a part of). Bronson (2008), another recent cult film, was an instant hit with angry men who love violence and yelling, but other than that it split everyone else down the middle. It took me almost two years to even consider Bronson an "ok" film. Nicolas Winding Refn's career kinda mirrors that of Donald Cammell (White Of The Eye, Demon Seed, Wild Side, etc) except a lot less tragic and on a slightly larger scale. 

In the film Ryan Gosling plays "Julian" - a gangster son of a femme fatale named "Crystal" (played by Kristin Scott Thomas with the attitude of Donatella Versace mixed with Naomi Campbell in a blonde wig). 

After Julian's brother; Billy is killed at the order of "Chang" (a badass Thai police officer with a love for Karaoke) Crystal wants everyone responsible for Billy's death to pay. She seeks out her younger son Julian to take care of it but given their complicated mother/son relationship (along with the horrific crime Julian's brother committed to begin with), Julian initially refuses to take her orders. But after a series of events he suddenly changes his mind and challenges Chang to a fight in order to settle the score.

If you loved Drive there's no guarantee you'll enjoy Only God Forgives. Even the music, once again scored by Cliff Martinez, is a lot darker and less pop-sounding this time around.
Although slightly more sinister and even more quiet, Ryan Gosling's performance is somewhat similar to the character he played in Drive.
This is a pretty dark film. Chang is one of Refn's cruelest characters (he prefers a sword to a gun), there's multiple scenes where people get their hands and/or arms chopped off or cut in too at the drop of a hat and there's some SERIOUS incestuous undertones between Julian & Crystal. A lot of hype has been made about Kristen Scott Thomas' portrayal as the bitchy villainous femme fatale because she doesn't normally portray these kinds of characters but after her recent performance in Love Crime I don't find her portrayal as Crystal that far fetched.

Besides Crystal, all the other characters in this film barely speak (no, seriously). The spacing between the dialogue in Only God Forgives is so far apart at times that when someone finally does speak (usually delivering two or three words in a strange unemotional way) it almost catches you off guard. Once again, this is another aspect I found to be interesting but it's understandable if others aren't in to it.

 

Vathaya Panssringarm's portrayal as Chang was the most fascinating to me. If there's ever been a "badass" he's certainly it. In on scene he allows the father of a murdered underage prostitute to beat his daughters' killer to death. Then in an unexpected switch he cuts off the father's hand as punishment for allowing his daughter to become a prostitute in the first place (this is a very eye for an eye kind of film). It should be noted that even though Vathaya Panssringarm is listed as Chang in the credits, no one ever actually addresses him by his name at any point in the film which adds to his mystique. He just kinda glides through the film as a sword wielding angel of vengeance...

My enjoyment of Only God Forgives is kinda bitter sweet. I loved it but I like feel once people see this when it opens (on Friday) I don’t think I'll be able to openly praise it without constantly hearing: "REALLY? You liked THAT?!" I'm sure there's a few folks out there who'll love it like I did but not many. 

This is a pretty existential story buried underneath a violent gangster movie yet it's understandable if some people find this film very flawed. There's quite a few random moments that may have some people going; "...huh?" (strange hallucination sequences, random karaoke scenes and aggressive moments that are totally uncalled for) plus the overall motivation of the characters is a little questionable at times.

But for some strange reason I loved almost everything about this movie. I just don’t know if I have the energy to defend it so I'm gonna quietly love it by myself like I do with Terrence Malick's recent work.

If you have the same kind of love for Showdown In Little Tokyo as well as 2001: A Space Odyssey and aren't bothered by the kinds of plot holes found in Michael Mann's films because they're so cool (something I struggle with) then chances are you'll enjoy this. However, if you like constant dialogue and for movies to make sense then you may wanna stay away from this.

CLOUD ATLAS: MIXED MESSAGES ON RACISM AND PROBLEMS WITH THE COSMIC RACE SOLUTION (SPECIAL GUEST WRITER: CHRIS ROBISCH)

Cloud Atlas is an interesting case - Not since Michael Mann's Public Enemies have I seen a movie get so much hype and then suddenly disappear in to thin air as if it never happened upon its release. Normally when that kind of thing happens to a film its rediscovered years later and becomes a "cult classic" but something tells me The Wachowski's latest sci-fi tale wont see the same fate.
Last year when I made my second appearance on the Inside The Phoenix podcast upon returning from the Toronto Film Festival I could tell Warren Anderson (a contributor to this site) really wanted to get in to this movie but I chose to watch Takeshi Kitano's Outrage sequel instead. Had I known Cloud Atlas brought up all the issues in this write-up, written by first time PINNLAND EMPIRE contributor; Chris Robisch, I would have certainly watched the epic sci-fi adventure over Kitano's violent art house blood bath. I'm sure I wouldn't have liked the Wachowski's latest film but it would have brought about some serious dialogue for Warren's podcast.
But in all honesty I don't think I know ONE person, besides Chris (a fellow turntablist/cinephile/Inglorious Basterds hater), whose seen Cloud Atlas so I don't feel that bad.

This is an excellent read and I've been sitting on it for quite some time.

Enjoy...

I finally buckled under the surmounting pressure building within my Sci-Fi addicted brain. I knew there would undeniably be some disappointment. Films that are so heavily hyped rarely satisfy my inner-nerd. Even with these misgivings towards watching it I decided to sit through Lana and Andy Wachowski’s unnecessarily long film, Cloud Atlas. My initial fears were justified. At times it was boring and extremely convoluted, as it made loose connections to stories that were supposedly inextricably linked. However, this wasn’t the real problem. In fact, I was mostly unsettled by the film’s message, as it attempted to present itself as anti-racist while wrapped in deeply racist ideologies. 

Double-Think:

Antiracist While Perpetuating Racism

It really is hard to take any film seriously that wishes to promote anti-racist story lines like the character Adam Ewing (Jim Sturgess), a white ally overcoming a white supremacist perspective to ultimately join the abolitionist movement, while simultaneously bombarding the audience with uncomfortable depictions of white actors made-up to look Asian. It seems completely counter intuitive to combine anti-racist sentiments with racist imagery, and this is precisely why the film’s narrative fails miserably.

My main contention with the film was not so much the racist “yellowface” displayed by white actors—which has already been written extensively about on sites like Racialicious.

Why did the directors choose to incorporate "Yellowface" but not "Blackface" into their film? Apparently they only find one to be racist

Nor was it the Orientalist semiotics and countless stereotypes interwoven into the supposedly anti-racist message.

is your room too blank and bland?

with the flip of a switch the Wachowskis will project their favorite Orientalist images on to your walls, floors and ceilings. The future sure is racist!

Racist stereotype: Orientalist Imagery coupled with Asian women as a sexualized objects can be found throughout the film

Racist Stereotype: the character simply called; "Mexican Woman" (Doona Bae) is a racist representation of Latina identity, flattening Latina-ness to elderly women with non-, or limited, English speaking capabilities.
The Wachowskis white imagination certainly went all out on this one by also making her the stereotypical sweatshop worker

It wasn’t even the way that the Wachowskis' used their racialized-makeup as cutting edge—I mean this is like one of the main special effects and story devices employed by the filmmakers and is utilized like Eddie Murphy in a fat suit.

"I'm cutting edge, Mr. Anderson!"

"What he said!"

No. None of these got under my skin as much as the way the film presents a combination of the above offenses with racial mixing. Lana and Andy attempt to convey this message through actors crossing racial boundaries. The idea of crossing the color line takes place not only in their relationships, but also by actors taking on the role of different races. By blurring these lines through a combination of ways, such as dawning “yellowface” or other racialized faces and having narratives of racial mixing, the directors are blending two very different elements dangerously close together. The Wachowskis constantly infuse their narrative of race mixing with the actors shifting races, presenting the act of crossing racial lines through an increasingly problematic, complicated, and uncomfortable lens creating numerous racist outcomes. The worst of which forces the audience to believe that  white actors in “yellowface” should be viewed with the same amount of acceptance as interracial relationships and multiracial families.

I'm pretty sure any ethical human being knows that interracial relationships and multicultural people...

...are not the equivalent to racist "Yellow-face" representations

Had Lana and Andy decided to use numerous actors of color as opposed to the race shifting methods in their film, the message of blurring racial difference through mixing would not have been lost in such troublesome racial politics. As a Chicano and Anglo male, I am open to narratives in film that discuss bi- and multi-racial identities—especially, when most films create distinctly rigid racial boundaries and continue the same-old discussions of racial purity that have plagued countries like the United States for centuries. However, the Wachowski narrative of multiracial people being the ultimate solution in race-relations can be viewed as an equally racist and offensive trope.

Not Really Breaking Barriers:

Trading One Racist System For Another

In response to the mounting criticisms surrounding the film Andy Wachowski explained to the Huffington Post, “[t]he intention is to talk about things that are beyond race. The character of this film is humanity.” Lana went further with the intent to move “beyond race” by stating:

“[T]he book has a bigger perspective. The book suggests that there is a humanity that is beyond our tribe, our ethnic features. A humanity that is beyond our gender. A humanity that unites all of us and transcends our tribal differences. As long as we continue to build these intractable and insurmountable walls between us to make these distinctions, we will continue to have intellectual apparatus that allows us to make wars and that allows to dominate, exploit and destroy others."

While the sentiments of Andy and Lana, as well as the book present an altruistic desire to move beyond race into a future humanity that eradicates the national, racial, and gendered social boundaries that keep us apart, the film fails to convey this message. The reason being, their film skips an extremely important process within confronting difficult subjects like race and racism. Their focus on smashing down barriers rather than first establishing a bridge between races makes it impossible for a real sense of connection to take place. In reality, the Wachowskis force colorblind perspectives on to US and Global audience members who exist in societies that have yet to truly develop bridges capable of manifesting a dialogue between races. Such a premise does not create a world where future allies listen and embrace the complexities and differences within our shared humanity. Instead it chooses to ignore, silence, and make people of color invisible reinforcing those walls that they want to tear down.

The Utopian vision that the Wachowskis' wish humanity to achieve, is reached through racial mixing—at least that is what the film implies. This is evident in the final scene of the film where an elderly Zachry (Tom Hanks) sits by a campfire telling stories to his and Meronym’s (Halle Berry) multiracial grandchildren. This moment acts as the concluding paragraph to the film’s thesis of racial mixing, which is defined as the ultimate solution to humanity’s racism problem. The images of mixed race children during the finale, creates a sense that this is humanity’s future. Love surrounds this family as the chaos of the past, the differences that are portrayed throughout the movie no longer matter. It is the presentation of peace and harmony within this future moment that leads me to the conclusion that these children are the manifestation of the mixed race savior. However, one might not be aware of how this concept recalls a historically racist ideology found in Latin America.

This may seem like a foreign concept to citizens of the West, as the racial ideologies in the United States have historically been based upon racial purity as a means to maintain white supremacy. The rigid racial boundaries were (re)enforced by antimiscegenation laws dating back over 300 years ago and finally being repealed in 1967. As a result the logical response to racism in the West has been the deconstructing of racial boundaries by promoting a multiracial ideology. However, in the early 1900s the ideology of Mestizaje (race-mixing) was promoted in Latin America to structure racial hierarchies in a different but equally racist fashion.

The idea was founded on scientific racism, a pseudo-science that provided justification for colonization, the enslavement of Africans, white-supremacy, and the eugenics movement—not to mention the Holocaust. The findings within scientific racism would always convey the superiority of whites and the inferiority of people of color. Some examples of studies are based on reflexes, cranium size, athleticism, and intellectual ability among other things.

Leo gave a pretty thorough overview of a form of scientific racism in that Tarantino film about racism that turned out to be way racist - the irony was not silent

The popular belief in the United States was that mixing made the supposed superior race inferior, while countries in Latin America somewhat reversed the idea of scientific racism. This alteration viewed mixing as a pathway to providing superior traits into the supposedly inferior indio and African populations. Influential scholars, like José Vasconcelos, advocated for an ideology of Mestizaje (race-mixing) to populate Latin American countries, whitening them in the process, and creating The Cosmic Race.  With countries like Mexico having difficulty increasing European immigration, The Cosmic Race worked as the solution to unifying people under a national identity. Since whiteness was still seen as superior, the only way to unify the nation was through mixing the existing European population with indigenous and African peoples. As a result, the mestizo (mixed person) was thought to be the savior of these nations.From its very foundation, the national ideology of racial mixing has been based upon a racist notion of eliminating the perceived inferior qualities of the other. Beyond that, it was thought that blending races would purge racism from society, but the fact remains that racial inequalities, colorism, and various forms of racism still exist in Latin American countries today.

Its interesting to think that the directors chose to place the final scene of Meronym (Berry), Zachry (Hanks) and the multiracial grandchildren in space. Was this the Wachowski's symbolic shout-out to Vasconcelos' Cosmic Race?

The result of the Latin American ideology was the creation of a racial hierarchical system that was based on the mestizo (mixed person) being the superior race and, much like the in the United States, Indigenous and African peoples were placed on the bottom—this is likely an intellectual apparatus that Lana did not account for when she defended her film. This historical reality complicates the film and directors' premise quite a bit as their perspective neglects to see the limitations of placing all of your hopes into the mixed-race saviors, especially when one considers that hybridity has had little impact on the realities of racism and race-relations in the United States.

Andrea Smith provides greater insight into the problems of the mestizo. According to Smith, this ideology constantly “situates Indians and Europeans in a dichotomy that can [only] be healed through mestizaje" making it appear as though real solutions cannot be found without erasing difference. Such a perspective seeks to eliminate the beauty of cultural, racial, and ethnic distinctions to make humanity into a colorblind society that does not embrace the multiplicity of identities that make it special. Moreover, this ideology categorizes the “Native identity...[as] primitive” and the mestizo as “sophisticated."  While Cloud Atlas does not touch on the relation between Native and European identities Smith’s words are still relevant, as they suggest a hierarchical system just as discriminatory as racial purity. With this in mind, it is clear to me that the film's premise can be a dangerous one. It can result in racist ideologies that lead to the erasure of indigenous peoples. While not entirely the same, it does hearken to the genocidal practices that eradicated the indigenous populations of the Americas. Smith provides a counter argument to the idea of racial mixing being the ultimate solution to racism and race-relations. If we are to consider the Wachowskis' premise we must educate ourselves on how it has been used in the past, as well as presently in places outside of the isolated western ideologies that Lana and Andy borrow from.

Andrea Smith's article; "Queer Theory and Native Studies: The Heteronormativity of Settler Colonialism" and other amazing articles can be found in the above book...

Unfortunately, the directors seem ill equipped to grapple with the complexities of race in any meaningful way. Instead they opted to trade one racist ideology (racial purity) for another (the mixed-race saviors). While their intentions might have been to dismantle the racialized systems of categorization I must say that the end result merely perpetuates that which it seeks to destroy.  In regards to race, it is imperative not to begin the conversation at the eradication and erasure of entire cultures by promoting colorblind mentalities. Rather, any discourse on race should start by first hearing the different voices in communities of color and embracing difference. Not merely accepting it and asking it to disappear. I get that Lana and Andy want us to exist in a post-racial society, but we cannot get to such an end game without first having some very tough discussions today—discussions that were entirely absent in Cloud Atlas.