REVIEW: Carnage

Carnage (2011): Dir. Roman Polanski. Written by: Roman Polanski and Yasmina Reza, based on the play "God of Carnage" by Yasmina Reza. Starring: Jodie Foster, Kate Winslet, Christoph Waltz and John C. Reilly. Rated R (Language). Running time: 79 minutes.

3 stars (out of four)

In Carnage, a new film directed by Roman Polanski and based on a play by Yasmina Reza, two couples meet in an apartment to discuss an incident involving their sons, Zachary and Ethan. Zachary hit Ethan with a stick in the playground and now Ethan needs surgery to replace two missing teeth. But there is no need for these four adults to get embroiled in their sons’ feud, they say. They’re bigger than that. Ethan’s parents (played by Jodie Foster and John C. Reilly) invite Zachary’s (Christoph Waltz and Kate Winslet) over their apartment to have a civilized conversation about how to proceed. The central irony of Carnage is that the parents are no better than their children. Indeed, they may be much, much worse.

Over the course of their conversation, tensions escalate and their talk moves away from cordialities and into a heated debate that touches on their marriages, parenting styles and the specific handling of a situation involving a hamster. Mostly though, the couples verbally tear each other apart until everyone is thoroughly miserable.

This potentially tedious premise is actually a lot of fun thanks largely to the actors, who dig into the material with great zeal. The script, written by Mr. Polanski and Ms. Reza, sometimes labors too hard to keep its characters in one room long after any sane individual would have left. The couples’ discourse has an undeniably stagy quality but the skilled cast is able make the whole affair seem perfectly natural.

Penelope (Foster) and Michael (Reilly), the host couple, are middle class New Yorkers pushing toward the upper middle. Michael has a small business selling furniture supplies and Penelope is an intellectual currently working on a book about “the Darfur tragedy.” John C. Reilly is an absolute joy to watch in the role. He is the perfect picture of geniality and good humor in the face of social discomfort, dispensing pleasantries and lame jokes that mostly fall on deaf ears. As the afternoon wears on, Michael sheds his role as peacekeeper and we see him for the short-tempered, stubborn man he is. Penelope is a little less multidimensional and gets a tad shrill by the end but is convincingly portrayed by Ms. Foster.

Kate Winslet gets the more fun role as Nancy, a stuffy, uptight lawyer who shows her true colors after a few drinks. Her husband, Alan (Waltz), is also a lawyer. He works for a pharmaceutical company that is currently in the midst of media fallout surrounding a drug’s side effects. Alan was able to spare enough time in his schedule to meet with Penelope and Michael but is constantly on his phone conducting business calls. Ms. Winslet plays nicely off Christoph Waltz. Every time the incessant ringing of Alan’s phone interrupts the couples’ conversation, Nancy shoots daggers at him while her lips contradict her with a polite smile. Mr. Waltz is great fun too; Alan is the voice of reason in the group, though his wisdom often comes in the form of condescending, cynical remarks.

Throughout the film, allegiances shift from couple against couple, to a battle of the sexes, and back again. Michael and Alan find common ground in their stubbornly chauvinistic ideas of masculinity and marriage. That is, until Alan makes fun of Michael’s humble business and the war returns to one of social class.

Carnage is a brief film without much of a resolution. Once the two couples have sufficiently ripped each other to shreds, it ends. Roman Polanski and Yasmina Reza manage to keep things light by not making the audience complicit in the vengeful feud onscreen. We are afforded a comfortable seat from which we can laugh at the characters’ indecencies without worrying whether we would fare any better in their places. Before you know it, the movie is over and we have emerged unscathed and entertained from the preceding whirlwind of negativity and anger. Mr. Polanski and Ms. Reza’s approach ensures that Carnage is not a terribly illuminating film but it is an enjoyable one.

- Steve Avigliano, 1/22/12

REVIEW: Contagion

Contagion (2011): Dir. Steven Soderbergh. Written by: Scott Z. Burns. Starring: Marion Cotillard, Matt Damon, Laurence Fishburne, Jude Law, Gwyneth Paltrow, Kate Winslet. Rated PG-13 (Language and gruesome symptoms). Running time: 106 minutes.

3 stars (out of four)

During a quiet scene in Contagion, the new film from director Steven Soderbergh, I became acutely aware of every sound in the theater – every crinkle of a wrapper, every clearing of a throat – and realized the film was doing what it was intended to do.

Early on in Contagion there is a reference to Jaws that reveals the film’s aim. Similar to how that Spielberg classic played on our fear of the open ocean and made audiences think twice before the next time they went for a dip, Contagion takes a common fear – a worldwide virus outbreak – and crafts an effective thriller around it. We learn in the film that we touch our faces hundreds of times per day, (a point reinforced by frequent close-ups of hands), an unconscious habit that allows for the rapid spread of disease. With that information planted in our minds, each cough and sniffle in the film (deliberately foregrounded in the audio mix) become Contagion’s fin in the water – a sign of impending danger.

The film builds its queasy energy by assembling several storylines with characters that are connected by the mysterious disease. There is the American (Gwyneth Paltrow) whose business trip to Hong Kong may be responsible for the initial spread of the disease. Her husband (Matt Damon) and daughter (Anna Jacoby-Heron) provide the emotional arc of the film as they grapple with day-to-day life while the virus takes hold of the country.

On the bureaucratic end of things are Dr. Cheever (Laurence Fishburne) and his protégé Dr. Mears (Kate Winslet) of the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) who investigate the disease in pursuit of a cure. Assisting in that goal are researchers Ian Sussman (Elliott Gould) and Dr. Hextall (Jennifer Ehle) as well as French correspondent Dr. Orantes (Marion Cotillard) whose investigation of the outbreak’s source in Hong Kong takes an unexpected turn.

Meanwhile, a vicious blogger named Alan Krumwiede (Jude Law) scrutinizes the CDC’s every move and makes allegations of a partnership between the government and pharmaceutical companies. He is a political revolutionary of the modern age whose shocking online posts bring new meaning to the phrase ‘viral videos.’

Krumwiede is one of the film’s many insistent (bordering on incessant) reminders that the film takes place in the present day. Information is obtained and spread through video surveillance, texting, Twitter and other technological advancements familiar to most Millennials. These contemporary details are pervasive to the point of being overwhelming, though perhaps that’s the point. Much of the film’s dialogue blows by in a flurry of acronyms and multisyllabic mouthfuls, a fair dramatization of information overload in the Internet Age.

Soderbergh handles this material well, though. His frenetic style makes sense of the chaos unfurling onscreen and pulls the film’s many characters together into a cogent whole. He balances tense scenes of frayed nerves and frantic phone calls with more sober moments of investigative reporting that plunge into the murky realm of geopolitics without getting didactic.

Emphasis on international affairs does lead to an inherent lack in human empathy. The film is more interested in presenting the inner workings (and subsequent failings) of government agencies than telling a story about individuals. Soderbergh explores the ways in which these agencies communicate with one another to find a balance between law and moral order when catastrophe strikes. Contagion is critical of the layers of red tape that prevent decisive action but never villainizes any of its characters.

On further reflection, the earlier comparison to Jaws is not a perfect one. In 1975, that film created – or at least propagated – a fear of shark attacks. The terror lurking behind every scene of Contagion, however, does not originate with the film but rather is one that has already attained a level of omnipresence in our lives. Whether the threat of a pandemic is just media noise or indeed the fate of mankind remains to be seen. Either way, Contagion thoroughly documents that fear for future generations and offers a chilling apocalyptic tale in the meantime.

- Steve Avigliano, 9/13/11

BEST OF THE DECADE - #8 : Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004): Dir. Michel Gondry. Written by Charlie Kaufman. Starring: Jim Carrey, Kate Winslet, Kirsten Dunst, Mark Ruffalo, Elijah Wood, Tom Wilkinson. Rated R (language, some drug and sexual content). Running time: 108 min.

Film is a visual medium that has the potential to show us things few other art forms can. Too often films are adapted from books and plays without giving us something new, something visual to hold on to that wasn’t there the first time. These films are simply interpretations of their source material, and while there is nothing inherently wrong with a simple interpretation, few filmmakers strive to do what director Michel Gondry and screenwriter Charlie Kaufman do in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. Here is an original screenplay that could not be told in any other medium but film, and demands a visual presentation. There are scenes in Eternal Sunshine that almost defy a verbal description, but make instant sense visually. In its exploration of the human mind and memory, the film uses imagery to find an emotional truth outside the limitations of words on a page or actors on a stage.

The story involves a medical clinic that, for a price, erases painful memories of a loved one following a death or break-up. Clementine Kruczynski’s (Kate Winslet) once happy relationship with her boyfriend Joel Barish (Jim Carrey) has disintegrated into misery and self-loathing, and so she decides to erase the memory of him from her mind. Joel, after learning what his ex-girlfriend has done, decides to do the same and much of the film takes place within Joel’s mind during the procedure. We follow Joel as he wanders backwards through memories of Clementine and we learn the details of their relationship as the memories are erased one by one. Michel Gondry creates some mesmerizing sequences by using careful editing and subtle effects to create the appearance of Joel’s memories being erased before his eyes.

However, for all its visual trickery and nonlinear storytelling, the film’s message is surprisingly simple and direct. As mementos of Clementine vanish and the procedure steals Joel’s dearest memories away from him, Joel begins to regret his decision and comes to the understanding that not all of his memories are painful, and even the painful ones might be worth keeping. The science-fiction premise becomes a launching point to examine our relationships to those we love and our memories of them. There is also a sense of modesty to the production, and Gondry never uses a visual effect unless it advances the story or enhances the emotional themes.

Charlie Kaufman’s screenplay also avoids being showy simply for the sake of it. There are several layers to the film and not until the end do we understand how every piece fits together, but Kaufman wisely makes every scene enjoyable the first time around before revealing its relationship to the larger story. The dialogue, as expected from a Kaufman script, is sharp and frequently funny. Kaufman shows an understanding of the ways in which people interact with one another. Every relationship in the film is fully fleshed out and authentic. The script is also wonderfully layered with several deteriorating relationships shown throughout the film, and even a second memory erasure that plays a large role in the ending. Kaufman also understands the workings of the human mind. We do not store memories chronologically, but in clusters relating to a person or a feeling. Joel and Clementine’s relationship is not presented in big, meaningful moments, but rather is shown through a series of small, intimate memories, because these are the ones that tend to last. Kaufman takes the time to dramatize the aspects of our life that don’t often get treated in movies. Joel plays out conversations in his mind, creates a running commentary on his memories, and revisits past events. Kaufman’s attention to these aspects of our lives is what allows us to connect with Eternal Sunshine on a personal level.

Eternal Sunshine is a fascinating film to figure out, and multiple viewings are necessary to understand it all, but the film is ultimately an emotional experience. Gondry’s visual imagination allows Kaufman to enter the human mind and show us, with astounding insight, how our memories process love and life.

- Steve Avigliano, 2/3/10