AUGUST 2002 FILMS

POSSESSION
(Neil Labute, 2002)

It was in 1992 that I read A.S. Byatt's Possession, part of my then-obsession with Booker Prize winners and nominees. Nowadays I'm reading less and the list is no longer as rigorous, but Byatt remains an author whose new works I read religiously.

Turning Possession into a movie is an unenviable task with its passion and intellect so internal, and when I heard Neil Labute was taking over the project, I wasn't exactly enthusiastic. IN THE COMPANY OF MEN, YOUR FRIENDS AND NEIGHBORS - sure Labute seems suited to the sexual tempests of academic life depicted in the novel (he reins his strength in too much) but how does he handle the calm intellect that is its bulk?

The perhaps unavoidable answer was to skim it. The universe of characters marking various strata of academia has been reduced with the women of the novel bearing the brunt of the loss.

Most glaring is the loss of the interior lives. Jennifer Ehle glows with suppliance when she's with Ash but lost is what draws Gwyneth Paltrow's Maud to Lamotte, those words penned from the ashes by this self-described witch in a turret. When Lamotte asks Ash, "did you not flame, and I catch fire?," this adaptation takes her to her word and Lamotte remains secondary to her more celebrated poet lover.

Americanizing Roland Michell brought little to the table beyond trans-Atlantic barbs. Aaron Eckhart displays all the intellectual conviction of a frat boy on a pledge week treasure hunt. He is the obvious signifier of what is wrong with POSSESSION. Think Keanu Reeves blurting "Whoa," overwhelmed by the skyscraper he has to jump off of THE MATRIX. (This better not be the start of a series of ill-fitting roles for Eckhart or he'll turn Rebecca Pidgeon to Labute's David Mamet.)

Gwyneth Paltrow fares much better with more of her British sang-froid but that won't stop me from thinking about wearing an aluminum foil skullcap just like in SIGNS just so she can stop appearing in films based on books I love. Coming up: Paltrow in the Miramax adaptation of Jeanette Winterson's The Passion - shudder.... [C+]

SUNSHINE STATE
(John Sayles, 2002)

Immediately after I saw SUNSHINE STATE, I went back to my workplace to finish some paperwork but wound up telling a co-worker (deservedly) to fuck off.

Yes, I do think SUNSHINE STATE contributed to this relaxed, loose-lipped state of mind. Matisse said he aimed to make art "like a good armchair," and along the same vein if you've seen Sayles' previous films SUNSHINE STATE will seem a familiar fit with sympathies where expected and few surprises. Except for Edie Falco's Marly, the characters reveal too readily the guiding hand of their maker and how they'll fit in Sayles' microcosm this time around. Watching this was like wearing a pair of well-worn slippers and I guess that comfort level creeped up to my tongue that day. I guess the moral is to watch your mouth when wearing comfortable shoes.

Or maybe I was pissed off since Sayles is usually much better. This microcosm has too many one-note characters with carefully speechified exits. When Mary Steenbergen's shrill festival organizer got impatient, I checked my watch, too. And checked it again later. Films so transparent shouldn't run 127 minutes long. [C]

In convenient capsule form:

Two-dimensional backgrounds, fully rounded characters - THE LADY AND THE DUKE(Eric Rohmer) is the anti-CLONE. This should be Royalty Magazine's best movie of the year. [B]

GOLDMEMBER (Jay Roach, 2002) is easily the worst of the series. Mike Myers hasn't forgotten about his hometown - there's a passing byline announcing the Maple Leafs winning the Stanley Cup - but his handlers have forgotten to remind him what "funny" and "work ethic" mean. This is obviously a patchwork with a new evil henchman so lame that even in SNL's most desperate season Lorne Michaels would've surely let him die as a concept. Myers scavenges through the easiest targets of pop culture and is not too shy about trying to squeeze a laugh out of forgotten bones. Mr Roboto? This deserves an F for effort. [D]

Had the dancers in Spike Jonze's Praise You video done their dance impromptu I imagine the audience would've been less than mesmerized. Irrepressibility requires effort and though THE HAPPINESS OF THE KATAKURIS manages to skate on the coattails of its characters' blind persistence Miike's lack of effort eventually shows. There's a disposability to it all as Miike hides behind the mask of amateurishness to get away with a minimum of effort. This may be Miike's career in a nutshell: irrepressible, yes, but until he learns to slow down and control his directorial A.D.D. results will be uneven. [C-]

There's no doubt that Sam Mendes is a director in the "classic" sense as he wields his classicism like a caveman with a club. As he beats you down with his statuette of the Winged Victory there's little doubt he forgot all about wings. Watching ROAD TO PERDITION was quite the depressing experience as an inflexible mind guides the heavy hand on your shoulder leading you to the road ahead where there's all soggy symbolism and no lightness. [B]