Podcasting Them Softly

Having an impressive visual style as a filmmaker is very important to me as a movie lover. Without it, we’re left with nothing to admire with our eyes, and since film is a visual medium first and foremost, when a script isn’t perfect, the material can be saved when the filmmaker has a distinct vision. Here’s one movie that not enough people are familiar with: Marc Forster’s extra-trippy thriller Stay. I’m not sure if it’s an entirely successful motion picture, but so much of it is so interesting, and it’s a near constant marvel to experience on a conceptual level, with one scene transitioning effortlessly and seamlessly into the next, giving off an extremely heightened, dreamlike quality which results in a movie that feels as if it’s been created in one long vertiginous take, sort of like Birdman on a bad acid trip. Released to extreme critical hostility except for a few passionate supporters, this mind-bender quickly disappeared from the handful of theaters it was dumped in during the fall of 2005, ultimately grossing less than $5 million domestically(!), and that’s a shame, because it’s one of the most stylish films that I can think of, with a whammy of an ending that’s both powerful and unique. Taking influences from Vertigo, The Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge, and with Forster even going on record at one point in saying that the works of Nicolas Roeg heavily inspired his aesthetic on Stay, this is a film that’s been art directed to within an inch of its life, and vigorously directed with an elaborate and dynamic aesthetic that propels every single shot. This is a work that continues to fascinate me on almost every level, but I can’t stress enough how intoxicating I find this film to be from a visual stand point; it’s a true wowser that’s flown so far under the radar as to almost make me sick.

The film’s brilliant cinematographer Roberto Schaefer, who has shot almost all of Forster’s always eye-catching work, must’ve had intensive meetings with his editor, Matt Cheese, as the filmmaker constructed the film to feel like a fever dream puzzle, with each shot interlocking with the next, using dissolves and morphing techniques to constantly startle the viewer and make them aware of the fact that nothing is as it seems within the tricky narrative. What’s also fantastic about Stay is that the intense visual style is in service of the story being told. Screenwriter David Benioff crafted a narrative that I’m not 100% sure I totally understand, even after multiple viewings, but I’m fine with that, because I enjoy getting the chance to discover new secrets that this film seems to be constantly holding up its sleeve. This is a tough one to explain. Watch the trailer. Or read Roger Ebert’s ***1/2 review; he boils it down better than I could ever attempt. The film stars Ewan McGregor as a paranoid psychiatrist suffering from odd dreams, a baby-faced Ryan Gosling as his suicidal patient, Naomi Watt’s as the doctor’s reluctant girlfriend and ex-patient, and Bob Hoskins, having a ball with a devilish glint in his eyes, as a blind, possibly unstable friend of McGregor’s who indulges the doctor in games of chess. Stay discusses various themes all revolving around life, death, the dream state, true love, and what might happen when we depart this planet. The film has the same weird, eerie quality of Denis Villeneuve’s ultimately superior head-scratcher Enemy, but even when Stay is possibly a bit to convoluted for its own good, there’s no denying that it has been made with supreme technical skill, and that there’s plenty to dissect even if all of the pieces don’t quite add up on first or second or third or fourth or fifth viewing.

This one made a nickel when it was released, my nickel actually, and I’ll never understand why it was left out to dry by the studio. Trance is an intense movie, fever dream-esque in almost all respects, and aggressively stylish from first frame to last. This was a major mind-teaser from exuberant and hyped-up filmmaker Danny Boyle who was in major Nicolas Roeg territory here, spinning a thematically complex and visually audacious tale with the help of screenwriters John Hodge and Joe Ahearne and the extraordinary cinematographer Anthony Dod Mantle. Shot with bold and super-saturated colors and edited with sensational zest by Jon Harris, this is one of those films that is so outlandish, so movie-movie, that you just have to sit back and relax and enjoy the incredibly wild show. When all is said and done, I don’t believe ONE THING about this picture, and yet, I absolutely love it, because it takes me on such a trippy journey that half of the fun is seeing how the filmmakers are constantly messing with my senses. Trance features a trio of engrossing performances from James McAvoy, Vincent Cassell, and Rosario Dawson, all of whom subvert your expectations and take their potentially duplicitious characters into surprising directions. Violent, sexy, and always potentially dangerous, this is a propulsive thriller with a final act that truly makes your head spin. Repeated viewings are a must, for multiple reasons.

Despite trading off of some of the more durable genre conventions of the stalker-thriller, eclective and underappreciated filmmaker Roger Michel’s gripping and exquisitely mounted film Enduring Love more than stakes it claim as one of the most provocative and stylish genre entires in recent years. Released in 2004 and starring a pre-007 Daniel Craig as a man who becomes inexorably linked to a mentally fractured and obsessive individual (Rhys Ifans in a chilling, unhinged performance of quiet determination), the nightmarish narrative centers on a tragic hot air balloon accident and the lives of the people who are impacted by the calamitous event. This incredibly scary sequence, as shot by the extremely skilled cinematographer Haris Zambarloukos (Locke, Venus), is thrillingly staged, as the piercing quality of the visuals leaves nothing to the imagination. After the life changing accident, Joe Penhall’s terse screenplay jumps back and forth between studying Craig’s emotionally strained relationship with his girlfriend (the always excellent Samantha Morton) and the sense of uneasiness that begins to grow as he realizes that Ifans is a man on a mission. And because Ifans is so eager to assert himself into Craig’s orbit, the film is able to hone in on the uncomfortable and inevitable fact that nothing good can come out of this perilous situation, as the story builds to an expected moment of shocking violence that doesn’t necessarily play out as fully expected. Adapted from Ian McEwan’s novel, this is one of the more icy and nasty psychological thrillers that I can think of in recent years.

Disturbing, engrossing, and totally underrated, 2014’s political thriller Kill the Messenger should have shocked and appalled all who saw it, but due to a crummy release strategy with zero marketing support offered up by the releasing studio (Focus Features) who seemed disinterested in their own film, this scrappy, true-story journalism thriller got buried at the theaters despite solid critical notices. Jeremy Renner is Gary Webb, a reporter for the San Jose Mercury News, who back in the mid 90’s was responsible for writing a series of controversial articles which implied that the CIA ran a drug smuggling operation to support the Nicaraguan Contra rebel army in an effort to fund their war. The ghettos of America, South Central Los Angeles in particular, became over-run with crack-cocaine, creating havoc and instability and an alarming death rate. CIA officials were tasked with using informants to keep the drug trade going, even going so far as to renting an apartment to store all of the cash that was coming in from the drug sales. Webb begins his quest to uncover the truth after he’s handed some sensitive government-approved information and he’s off and running, heading down to Nicaragua to meet with potential sources, all the while trying, and failing, to secure one legit source from within the CIA to verify what he’s learned. The movie painfully displays how Webb’s family life began to suffer as a result of his dogged determination, and the unwanted advances of nefarious government types who routinely try to keep information suppressed and Webb off track with his story. One of the many unsettling messages that this film repeatedly drives home is that the notion that the CIA will do anything to protect their interests; the way they smeared Webb’s life and career was disgraceful, and it’s no surprise to learn that Webb’s life was effectively ruined as a result of him just doing his job.

Efficiently and energetically directed by Homeland’s Michael Cuesta and absorbingly written by Peter Landesman (the writer/director of the equally underappreciated Concussion), the film has a terrific supporting cast including Rosemarie DeWitt, Oliver Platt, Ray Liotta, Andy Garcia, Mary-Elizabeth Winstead, Michael Sheen, Barry Pepper, Tim Blake Nelson, and Michael K. Williams. But this is Renner’s show all the way and he’s absolutely fantastic in the leading role of Webb, displaying an idealistic yet never foolhardy approach to his job, all the while trying to maintain his home life and the demands of his profession. Sympathetic, doggedly determined, and always trying to make the best out of any potentially compromised position he’s in, this is easily one of the best performances Renner has delivered since his breakout turn in The Hurt Locker. It always seems like Renner gives juicy supporting turns but then gets overshadowed by the flashier performances that surround him. But not here. He owned every single frame of this movie. Sean Bobbitt’s ground-level camerawork kept a sense of intimate paranoia while Brian Kates’ fleet editing contributed to the quick but coherent pace by exuding nothing but forward momentum. And it has to be said – people should have been sickened by the revelations of corruption that Webb’s work brought about, and a movie like this one should have acted as a rallying call. Feeling very much like a product of the 70’s in terms of documenting social injustice and something tangible and topical without dipping into excessive melodrama or implausibility, it’s no real surprise that general audiences weren’t interested or shocked by what they saw, if they did see it. It’s a further reminder of how complacent we’ve become on the big issues, old or new, that surround us every day.